Dean Dennis of Global Spectrum, an unsuccessful bidder for the right to manage Tulsa's new arena and old convention center, flew to Tulsa on Thursday to ask a question: "How could they have more points on the scoring sheet for compensation?" "They" is SMG, the successful bidder, and the question refers to the fact that Global Spectrum made a lower (better) bid for compensation -- their management fees -- than SMG, and yet the committee that evaluated the bids ranked SMG higher in that category. No one answered his question. Chris Medlock has more on the story, with audio of the unanswered question. In this kind of a bid process, each evaluator ranks the bidders in each of several categories, and the ranking is added up for a total score. It's sort of like scoring a boxing match. It increasingly appears that the committee members tweaked their numbers in individual categories to make sure that SMG came out on top, even if SMG wasn't objectively the best bid in a particular category.

If companies don't think they'll get a fair hearing, who will want to do business with the City of Tulsa? I'm glad that Global Spectrum and Professional Bull Riders are making some noise about the way they were treated by Mayor Bill LaFortune, his staff, and his handpicked committee. Nothing will change until people are willing to speak out.