A construction company on Tuesday agreed to pay the government a $3 million fine for exploiting regulations aimed at increasing the role of minority-owned businesses in order to win a multimillion-dollar contract to remove groundwater at the World Trade Center Transportation Hub project site.
Under a settlement approved by Manhattan federal Judge Laura Taylor Swain, Moretrench American Corp. admitted falsely securing the federally funded subcontracting job by misrepresenting to the Port Authority that it paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to a “disadvantaged business” to perform work.
In reality, the company didn’t perform work but simply received a kickback from Moretrench for the bogus use of its “disadvantaged business” status.
Moretrench also agreed to pay the PA’s Office of Inspector General $50,000 for the cost of its probe.