How CapRadio’s ex-treasurer brokered $1.1M in contracts — with his own company
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- CapRadio leaders bypassed RFPs and awarded $1.1M in contracts to then-board treasurer's firm.
- Emails show personal favors, gifts and hiring decisions took place as treasurer tried to win a business contract.
- CapRadio enacted stricter controls: board approval thresholds and RFP rules.
Two influential Capital Public Radio leaders skirted guardrails intended to fortify the nonprofit against ethical lapses and steered $1.1 million in contracts to a former board treasurer’s company.
Bill Yee, then-CapRadio’s board treasurer, initiated a conversation in 2018 to secure a deal to supply the station’s new headquarters with furniture from his company. He emailed Jun Reina, then CFO and COO, to ask if they could bypass the formal process for bidding on a project, known as a request for proposal, or RFP.
“Is there any way we can avoid a formal RFP process?” Yee emailed Reina in April 2018.
“I’m pretty sure we could do that,” Reina responded two minutes later.
Yee’s Western Contract company secured two deals with CapRadio — the first in December 2021 for about $126,000 and the second in May 2022 for about $992,000.
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1010 8th Street
730 I Street
The Sacramento Bee obtained, through a public records request, more than 1,000 pages of emails, board meeting minutes and contracts spanning 2017 through 2024 to piece together how Yee landed the two deals.
Over five years, Yee offered Reina personal favors while brokering these transactions and succeeded in bypassing the competitive bid process, records show. Both men signed one of their contracts prior to getting board approval.
Yee and Reina did not respond to a request for comment.
Administrators at Sacramento State, which has oversight authority of CapRadio, became concerned about conflicts of interest at the station following a 2023 audit.
“The audit pointed out some real serious concerns about what’s happening with Cap Public Radio,” Sacramento State President Luke Wood told The Bee in 2023. “And we need to understand at a deeper level what happened, how it happened, who knew, so that we can be responsible stewards of this entity.”
As an auxiliary of Sacramento State, the radio station falls under the rules of the California State University system, which has a detailed RFP process in which businesses must follow a series of steps to compete for a contract.
CapRadio did not disclose Yee’s potential conflicts of interest in IRS Form 990 filings, forms that most tax-exempt organizations must log annually to make sure the dollars they amass are being appropriately spent.
“In this sense, the disclosures follow the adage that sunlight is the best disinfectant,” said Brian Mittendorf, a professor at Ohio State University’s Max M. Fisher College of Business, who studies nonprofits.
This story details the conversations and circumstances that led to Yee landing these lucrative deals. The radio station has since adopted safeguards to prevent future problems.
“This is a cautionary tale that highlights the risks of nonprofit boards that don’t scrutinize long-time leaders and practices, which can result in dire consequences,” Chief Marketing and Revenue Officer Chris Bruno wrote in an email. “Today, CapRadio’s board can be used as a shining example of how public media should embrace transparency with the public, act as vigilant stewards and build trust with the broader community.”
The two deals Yee secured came as the radio station embarked on a move off the campus of Sacramento State. In 2016, CapRadio began to court donors to fund a multimillion-dollar relocation project into buildings at 1010 8th St. and 730 I St.
CapRadio, under Reina’s leadership, raised millions, but the ambitious plans to move its headquarters downtown never materialized. Reina departed the station in June 2023 and is now a subject of an embezzlement investigation by the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office. A Sheriff’s Office spokesperson said Yee was not part of this investigation.
In 2024, CapRadio’s current Interim President and General Manager Frank Maranzino broached a meeting with Yee to discuss the furniture company’s contract as the station addressed its financial crisis. Yee wrote to Maranzino after their meeting and said he recused himself as the board voted on Western Contract’s proposal.
“I felt I was being somewhat threatened that there was any type of impropriety, a conflict and the entire agreement and contract was invalid,” Yee wrote to Maranzino on July 16, 2024. “(...) I have served the board with the highest integrity and really cared for the best interest of the organization and have donated to the Capitol Campaign, personally.”
CapRadio treasurer gifts Kings tickets & favors
For about eight years, Yee served on CapRadio’s board and bonded with Reina, records show. They shared interests beyond the radio station’s board room, swapping personal details of their international golfing excursions and gifting each other tickets to events.
Yee gave Reina tickets for “great seats” to a Kings vs. Houston Rockets game in 2019, an email shows, as he courted the executive with access to a VIP section where free food and drinks flowed.
“Now who can say no to that!” Reina responded in an email.
Yee also lavished praise on Reina. In an email discussing board committee appointments, Reina asked Yee if he was willing to continue his position as chair of the Finance Committee. Yee agreed and commended his leadership in an email Aug. 13, 2020.
“This is my favorite board and it continues to be the benchmark with your leadership! Lead on!”
A month before Yee and Reina signed Western Contract’s most lucrative deal with CapRadio, emails show that Yee hired Reina’s daughter at the company.
Reina wrote Yee on April 18, 2022 and mentioned a trip to Scotland and Ireland — “walked over 84 miles just for golf and played in all 4 seasons.”
Reina then thanked Yee for giving his daughter a job and said “She’s very excited.”
“She’s super bright and just awesome, our team really like her a lot,” Yee responded later that day.
On May 18, 2022, Reina signed a contract with Yee’s company for about $992,000 to furnish the offices at 730 I St.
CapRadio GM signs first furniture deal
Reina initially, in 2018, considered at least three furniture companies when the radio station’s relocation efforts to 1010 8th St. began. CapRadio didn’t rent the I Street office until three years later.
Reina fielded interest from local furniture companies Western Contract, Miles Treaster & Associates (MTA) and Seats and Stations to outfit the Eighth Street building, emails show.
Western Contract has for decades been rooted in the capital region and boasts high-profile clients such as the Kings and the Sacramento Metropolitan Fire District, according to its website.
Yee caught wind that MTA, Western Contract’s top competitor, was talking to Reina and asked if a competitive bid process could be avoided. Reina reassured Yee.
“My intention was to work with you first and possibly have other vendors fill in any gaps,” Reina wrote to Yee on April 16, 2018. At the time, he was CapRadio’s COO and CFO, not yet having assumed the position of general manager.
By April 2021, Yee was eight months away from scoring the first furniture deal. Despite Reina indicating for years he would work with Western Contract, he described how Yee panicked at the idea of numerous furniture companies winning business.
On April 17, 2021, at 2:22 a.m., Yee sent an email to Reina and apologized for interrupting his vacation. He hoped to speak with him after Reina returned.
“My rep mentioned getting information about using multiple furniture vendors? Not sure what that means.” He went on to write Western Contract had “positioned a very aggressive pricing schedule for maximum value and benefit to CapRadio.”
But Yee apparently did not have to worry about much. Reina responded and scheduled a phone conversation when he returned to work.
“Sounds good Bill. And you know you’re our guy ;)” Reina wrote.
“Whew! Thanks so much, Jun!” Yee wrote back.
In a separate email exchange on April 22, 2021, Reina recounted this communication with Yee to a representative with architecture firm, LPAS Architecture + Design, which helped lay out the downtown buildings.
“Bill Yee was panicking because he heard we were shopping out our (furniture, fixtures and equipment) to multiple vendors. I assured him he was our guy but we were considering throwing Hogue a bone with some of the 1010 furnishings.”
“I would like to get most, if not everything, from Western Contract but I’ll also be leaning on you for recommendations,” Reina wrote in the email.
There were no discussions about this contract before the board, meeting minutes from 2018-21 show. And the signing of the contract appeared to be in conflict with CapRadio’s then-bylaws.
The bylaws from that time state: “The Board must approve, authorize or ratify any such contract or transaction in good faith and by vote sufficient without counting the vote of the common Director(s).”
But Reina, now CapRadio’s general manager, would eventually ink in December 2021 a deal for about $126,000 with Western Contract. There is no publicly available record of CapRadio’s board approving it.
Bruno, CapRadio’s spokesperson, stated CapRadio’s current policies stipulate that if a contract is signed without board approval, “such a contract is voidable, unless ratified by a subsequent vote of approval by the Board of Directors.”
“This policy requiring board authorization for major purchases prevents any general manager or employee from single-handedly making financial decisions that could have grave repercussions for the organization,” Bruno wrote.
Avoiding a conflict of interest?
Reina acknowledged the board needed to approve Western Contract’s second, more lucrative deal prior to him signing it in May 2022.
But he and Yee didn’t wait to put ink on paper. Before committee and full board votes occurred, both Yee and Reina signed the $992,000 contract.
A week before signing the contract, Reina had noted that the agreement with Yee might run afoul of CapRadio’s conflict of interest policies. Reina approached CapRadio’s board chair, Kim Silvers, to discuss how to handle the issue, emails show.
“Western Contract is our furniture supplier for both downtown spaces,” Reina wrote on May 11, 2022. “(...) I was reading through our conflict of interest statement and it looks like we need to review it. I can tee it up at the finance committee if you agree.”
“Good for Bill!” Silvers wrote back. “Yes, let’s do this. (…) Looks like this would also go to the full board?”
“I’m not sure,” Reina wrote in response, and then quoted from CapRadio’s bylaws. “‘Unless it is established that the contract is just and reasonable …’ I’m wondering if the finance committee can establish that and we just report out at the board meeting.”
Silvers pushed back.
“I’d like to be above reproach on this,” she wrote in the same email exchange. “Given that the awarded contract is going to the board Treasurer who leads the Finance (committee), it seems right that this should go to, at least, the Exec (committee).
“The full board would be even better in my eyes.”
Reina conceded to Silvers’ point.
“You’re right that optics are not good if we only leave at finance given that Bill chairs the committee,” he wrote on May 11, 2022.
On May 18, 2022, Reina signed the contract. Silvers said in a recent email to The Bee she did not know when the contract was signed.
The finance committee meeting was scheduled for May 25, 2022. The agenda lists discussing the “730 I St. Furniture Contract” but meeting minutes do not note if committee members took a vote on the contract or even discussed it.
The full board meeting took place the following day. There, the meeting minutes reference a bid process by CapRadio’s architects, LPAS, and declare Western Contract to offer “favorable and reasonable” terms.
CapRadio’s board approved the $992,000 deal.
What happened to the competition
When questioned 18 months after the board approved the second contract, a project manager with LPAS said that the bid process never happened, contradicting information contained in CapRadio’s board meeting minutes.
The May 26, 2022, CapRadio meeting minutes state:
“Western Contract was selected as the vendor for our downtown facility. The selection went through a bid process administered by LPAS. Compared to other bids, Western Contract was $193K less and offered better terms. The Finance Committee agreed that the bid process was fair, and the contract is favorable and reasonable. The Finance Committee requested full board approval since Yee is President/CEO of Western Contract and CapRadio’s Board Treasurer,” according to board meeting minutes.
Reina emailed a principal with LPAS on May 25, 2022, the day of the finance committee meeting, and asked the architecture firm: “When you bid out the furniture did MTA come in significantly more expensive than Western Contract? I’m asking because I need to have our Western Contract agreement approved by our board given that Bill is a board member (and our treasurer at that).”
In response, Kristina Gwinn, a principal at LPAS, relayed the preliminary estimate that MTA offered for budgeting purposes, which is not a formal bid process. In contrast, a proposal submitted in an RFP process outlines exact cost specifications for products and services.
Gwinn said a “budgetary pricing” to outfit 1010 8th St. totaled $1,088,332 from MTA and $895,094 from Western Contract. The difference between these two prices totals about $193,000, which is the same number referenced in the board meeting minutes.
The capital campaign and the move to both downtown buildings fell apart in 2023. After, a person whose name is redacted in the records, emailed a LPAS project manager Kristopher Maddox to learn more about the bid process.
“LPAS did not develop or issue an RFP for either project,” he wrote on Nov. 28, 2023. “LPAS’s understanding is there was no formal RFP process.”
Emails show there were at least two companies, aside from Western Contract, that offered some furniture concepts to CapRadio: MTA and Seats for Stations.
In 2018, MTA was asked to put together furniture concepts and budgets. But, at this point, CapRadio had not signed a lease for a second building at 730 I St.
“We were never asked to provide a formal RFP, and we reached out for a couple years to LPAS and Contractor and never heard from anyone,” MTA President Rachael Camillo-Bennett wrote Nov. 29, 2023 in response to an inquiry from someone at CapRadio about the RFP process.
The second competitor, Seats and Stations, only provided furniture options for a building at 1010 8th St. and never 730 I St., records show.
“Cap Radio Canceled the RFP,” Dennie Moreno, the founder of Seats and Stations, wrote Nov. 29, 2023.
No records have been made public that reveal what documents board members reviewed during their meeting to compare bids. The board meeting minutes do not indicate a representative from LPAS gave a presentation or attended the meeting.
In the years since the audit of CapRadio made public many of its issues, the station’s new leadership has implemented internal controls and policy updates, Chief Marketing and Revenue Officer Bruno said. He noted that their bylaws no longer allow staff to authorize contracts over $100,000 without board approval, and the station requires RFP bidding on contracts worth $50,000 and more.
