A business tied to a longtime supporter of President Trump was given a no-bid contract to install a water-purification system in the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool earlier this spring.
Now that work is coming under scrutiny after algae blooms have come back and turned the iconic pool in Washington a vibrant shade of green rather than the American-flag blue Mr. Trump says he chose.
The contract shows that the National Park Service bypassed the competitive-bidding process that is typically required, and gave a $1.7 million contract to the firm, Greenwater Services of Brookfield, Ohio.
Federal contracting records show that firm’s ultimate owner is the J.J. Cafaro Investment Trust, led by John J. Cafaro, a donor to Mr. Trump and a neighbor to Mar-a-Lago, the president’s private club in Florida. The water treatment company also listed Mr. Cafaro’s Palm Beach mansion as its address in Florida corporate records, and listed his investment trust’s phone number and email in Ohio lobbying records.
Mr. Cafaro, a longtime Republican donor whom Mr. Trump has described as a “fantastic man,” was once involved in a high-profile bribery scandal. He has also donated to Democrats in the past, and his daughter Capri Cafaro served in the Ohio State Senate as a Democrat from 2007 to 2016.
On Thursday, when a photographer for The New York Times visited the pool, about half of its water remained green, as workers sought to vacuum out algae. Workers have also added hydrogen peroxide to the water in recent days in an attempt to kill the algae, the Interior Department said in an email to The Times.
The department, which oversees the National Park Service, said that the firm had already brought temporary water-purification sites to the pool, and that it was expected to install a permanent system this week.
Katie Martin, a spokeswoman for the department, declined to say why the Park Service had refilled the pool before the permanent system was in place — raising the risk that it would quickly be clouded with algae.
The connection of Greenwater Services — also known as Green Water Solutions — to Mr. Cafaro is being reported first by The New York Times.
Neither Greenwater Services nor Mr. Cafaro responded to requests for comment on Thursday. The chief executive of Greenwater Services previously declined to comment to The Times about its contract.
Ms. Martin, the spokeswoman for the Interior Department, said that the department had not been aware of Mr. Cafaro’s political affiliation when it awarded the contract.
“This company was selected because they had the expertise, work force and materials” needed to complete the job in time, she said.
Ms. Martin and a White House spokeswoman both said the White House was not involved in the selection of this company.
The Times previously reported that David Schutzenhofer, the general manager of Mr. Trump’s golf club in Bedminster, N.J., advised the Park Service on the project and was in contact with Greenwater in January.
The Reflecting Pool’s water is circulated via underground pipes to a nearby building full of filters and water purifiers. The Park Service had planned for years to upgrade that system by adding a “nano bubble” device that killed algae with tiny bubbles of ozone gas.
In a public filing, the Park Service said that multiple firms had expressed interest in providing such a system. But in April, it gave the work directly to Greenwater Services, a company that federal records show had received only one other federal contract.
The Park Service justified its decision to bypass competition by citing an exemption meant for urgent situations: It said there was no time to consider other offers because the system had to be installed in time for events celebrating the country’s 250th birthday. That document did not give a specific date by which the system had to be installed.
Another no-bid contract for $14.7 million had been awarded to a Virginia firm, Atlantic Industrial Coatings, for the same reason of urgent need. That business was paid to spread blue waterproofing material on the pool’s concrete floor.
That work, too, shows signs of potential trouble. On Thursday, a section of the pool’s new layer of blue waterproofing appeared to have detached from the bottom and floated to the pool’s surface.
Ms. Martin, the Interior Department spokeswoman, declined to comment on that. Atlantic Industrial Coatings did not respond to a request for comment.
Greenwater Services was founded in 2019 in Ohio. State records in Ohio and Florida show that it has shared two addresses, a phone number and an email with Mr. Cafaro and his trusts.
Mr. Cafaro’s family business was in developing shopping centers, but he branched into other industries, including aerospace. He pleaded guilty in 2001 to conspiracy to bribe Representative James A. Traficant Jr., Democrat of Ohio, and later testified against Mr. Traficant.
Mr. Cafaro’s ties to Mr. Trump go back at least 10 years. In 2016, Mr. Trump boycotted a Republican debate and held a competing event, a televised fund-raiser for veterans causes. One of the major donors was Mr. Cafaro, who gave $50,000.
“J.J. Cafaro from Florida and from Cleveland: He’s a man who made a lot of money in Cleveland, does a good job, and a fantastic man,” Mr. Trump said from the stage. “J.J., thank you.”
Mr. Cafaro told The Palm Beach Daily News at the time that Ivanka Trump, the future president’s daughter, had called him to ask for the gift.
Since then, campaign finance records indicate that Mr. Cafaro has given more than $300,000 to political committees connected to Mr. Trump. When the president’s Mar-a-Lago Club hosted the lavish International Red Cross Ball in 2017, Mr. Cafaro’s wife, Janet, was the event’s chairwoman.
Salwan Georges contribute reporting.
