Electronic Data Systems, the jilted computer company that learned a few weeks ago that the state wants someone else to process its Medicaid claims, wants to talk it over.
Lanier Cansler, state Department of Health and Human Services secretary, doesn't want to hear anything about it, Lynn Bonner reports.
An EDS lawyer sent a letter last week asking Dempsey Benton for a meeting to talk about why the state chose Computer Sciences Corp. Benton was days away from leaving the DHHS secretary's job.
Cansler, who until last week was a registered lobbyist for CSC, sent a memo to a half-dozen administrators and the agency's lawyer Monday, telling them he would not participate in the decision whether or not to grant EDS a meeting, and asking them not to talk to him about it.
Cansler has promised to wall himself off from any potential EDS protest.
State rules allow an agency's executive officer to give the job of reviewing meeting requests to someone else. On Benton's last day as secretary, he assigned the job to deputy secretary Dan Stewart.
EDS has been doing the job for more than 30 years, but its bid was higher than CSC's $265.2 million bid.
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