Since 1982, Connecticut state law has mandated that for every state-financed construction project, 25% of state funding be “set-aside” for small and minority-owned businesses, known as SMBEs (small and minority-owned business enterprises). For decades, minority contractors have decried state officials for their failure to meet these goals. 

In May, Bernard Thomas, Board Chair of the Minority Construction Council, and several other anonymous minority contractors shared their various complaints with Inside Investigator. One of their grievances was the propensity of general contractors, large firms that receive the majority of state construction projects, to squeeze minority subcontractors financially.

Over his 20 years working in Connecticut’s construction industry, Thomas has seen “probably 25 to 50” minority subcontractors go out of business due to insufficient or delayed reimbursement by general contractors. He alleges they have been shortchanged by large firms and state agency officials who aren’t delivering needed accountability.

“If you hear the stories from all these contractors, these guys aren’t getting paid for two, three months, and they’re continuing to do work,” said Thomas. “They’re eating up their line of credit. They’re taking credit out on their houses; they’re losing their businesses. All of this is unacceptable.”

Normando Moquete Jr., owner of Pinnacle Maintenance, an SMBE that specializes in building rehabilitation, shared with Inside Investigator his own experiences being squeezed by Haynes Construction, a large general contractor which he says “systematically bankrupts” SMBEs like him 

“They expect us [subcontractors] all to eat the cost,” said Moquete. “I fought them for three months to get my change orders, and then approve them, and that’s why I’m suing them too, for over $200,000 in change orders.”

In his suit, Moquete accused Haynes of owing him a total of $695,182.40: $363,442.75 in “base balance,” payment for services agreed upon in the original contract, and $212,000 in change orders, expenses that were not accounted for in the original contract but necessary to complete the work. Moquete said that while many minority contractors have kept quiet for fear of being blacklisted by general contractors, he is sharing his story because he’s sick and tired of the status quo.

“They’re just systematically bankrupting people, and they’re getting 99% of the business in Connecticut,” said Moquete. “I need to speak up and I’m probably the first one to do so; and I’m probably gonna be blackballed or blacklisted because of this, but I’ve been doing this for 30 years and I can’t let Haynes continue to bully people, especially minority contractors.”

Normando’s Story

Moquete has worked in the construction trades for 30-plus years and founded Pinnacle Maintenance in 2012. Specializing in building rehabilitation, Pinnacle has been a state-certified minority business owner for 12 years, receiving its MBE (Minority Business Enterprise) certificate from the Department of Administrative Services in 2014. 

Over the years, Moquete said Pinnacle has rehabbed over 1,000 units for “about 10” housing authorities across the state. In late 2024, he was approached by Bruce Whittaker, a property developer with whom he’s worked closely over the years, to do a job in Hartford. Whittaker’s company, Millennium Real Estate Services, provides consulting and development services for affordable housing projects. 

Whittaker told Moquete that Haynes Construction, a large general contractor based in Seymour, was looking for someone to rehab units for the Northeast Hartford Affordable Housing II (NHAH II) project, a 10-building, 78-unit affordable housing development. Moquete Jr. described the work as “gutting them [the units] and putting them back together again.”

“Ripping out all the bathtubs, all the sinks, all the cabinets, all the flooring, putting in new windows, new doors, new trim, new paint job, new tubs — new everything, pretty much,” said Moquete.

Upon reviewing the plans, Moquete said that Millennium had a “good vision” for the property, and that he was “excited” to get to work, with the understanding that work would begin in January 2025. Unfortunately for Moquete, when January rolled around, the project was delayed, leaving him “to scrounge to look for more work.” Ultimately, Moquete got the green light from Whittaker in April.

“He called me on a Friday,” said Moquete. “I remember because I was leaving for vacation on Tuesday with my family, [and he said] ‘Hey, I need you to start on April 15.’” 

Moquete decided to call off his vacation and begin work, weeks before he even had a contract from Haynes to sign. Moquete said he did it because of his relationship with Whittaker, whom he’s known for 30 years and described as his mentor.

“He’s a good dude, he means well, I trust him,” said Moquete. “It’s just Haynes that’s the problem.”

Moquete said he “had reservations about Haynes,” but that Whittaker’s assurances put him at ease. He started off demoing 30 empty units, which he called “shitshows.”

“They were all abandoned,” said Moquete. “They were crack houses, there was flooding, theft — they were dilapidated, boarded up and everything.”

Moquete signed his contract with Haynes the last week of April. He said his crew “had to wait on others to catch up,” eventually waiting until the end of May for an electrician to wire the units. 

“I started ordering materials, started getting the painting started, and had to pull permits for the plumbing that took the town forever, because Haynes didn’t have their shit together,” said Moquete. “So, the whole job was mismanaged from the very beginning; we started with no permits, no materials, no office really.”

Six weeks after starting work, Moquete said he started “hurting financially,” after paying out of pocket for labor costs and dumpster fees, and he reached out to Haynes’ management to ask when he could expect payment.

 “‘Oh, we haven’t got paid from CHFA [Connecticut Housing Finance Authority],’” Moquete recalls being told. “It’s the end of May, and it’s been, you know, at least 40 days with no check, no nothing, and I’m a small operator, you know, I have payroll overhead, right? So, I’ve tapped out my line of credit, and I’m struggling.” 

Moquete eventually received $47,000 in June, an amount he claims was woefully insufficient to meet the expenses he had already incurred; by that time, he said Haynes owed him over $300,000 in total.

“$47,000?” said Moquete. “That doesn’t even cover my payroll. They were like, ‘Well, we haven’t got paid, that’s all we can give you for now.’”

CHFA’s Communications Director, Maura Martin, explained that funds are released to developers at the beginning of every month. From there, developers release funds to the general contractors, who are required, by law, to release those funds to subcontractors within 15 days.

“We process mortgage loan advance requests presented to us by the developer/borrower once a month,” said Martin. “Typically, those requests are due at the beginning of the month and if submitted timely and completely by the borrower, will be processed and paid by CHFA in the same month. CHFA is unaware of any systemic delays in the completion of mortgage loan advances.”

Out of credit and desperate for money, Moquete took a mechanic’s lien out on the property in early July. Mechanic’s liens are a type of lien taken out by unpaid contractors that gives them equity in the property equal to the amount they’re owed. It cost Moquete an additional $6,000 to pay his lawyer.

“I liened the property and Bruce calls me and says, ‘Why are you liening the property?’” said Moquete. “I said, ‘Hey, I’m going bankrupt. What do you want me to do?’”

Whittaker asked Moquete how much he was owed, and Moquete told him he needed “$170,000 at least.” Whittaker gave Moquete a check the same day, despite Haynes owing him the money, and Moquete withdrew the lien.

“So the developer paid me out of his pocket to pull the lien so that they won’t stop jobs,” said Moquete. “That was already a red flag for me.”

Shortly after receiving his check from Whittaker in early July, Moquete said Haynes “got nervous” and paid him a second check, $48,000, on July 14. 

“If it wasn’t for Bruce, I would have been bankrupt,” said Moquete.

Payment delays were only one problem, said Moquete, with worksite delays being another. After he took out the mechanic’s lien, Moquete said he started to take notes on the project’s worksite delays because he “knew this was gonna get worse.” In total, he counted 168 delays from when he took out the lien to when his crew finished their work in April 2026.

“I’m sitting waiting for doors,” said Moquete. “I’m waiting for windows, so that when windows get put in, I could then paint. Because you know, once they rip out the window, they make a mess, I got to go back and patch.”

Moquete also says the worksite delays caused unnecessary labor costs. 

“Every time there was a delay, I couldn’t walk off the job,” said Moquete. “I had to keep the guys on site, so it cost me labor, time, material — so we had to move on to the next unit, but we couldn’t finish anything, because we’re waiting on doors, we’re waiting on windows, we’re waiting on cabinets.”

The worksite delays, which Moquete stressed were of no fault of his own, were then used by Haynes’ project managers, Amanda Warren and Rob Flament, as rationale to short him on pay. Moquete called the two “inept,” and said that whenever he billed expenses to them, he could expect only half to be approved.

“She said, ‘Oh no, she didn’t approve it, you didn’t finish the units,’ I said, ‘Well, I couldn’t finish the units because you didn’t have the materials on time!’” said Moquete. “I had to wait for doors that were the wrong size — there were so many fuck ups with the job.”

Bathtubs were another example of a “fuck up” that Moquete gave; he said the project’s architects envisioned 60 x 32 wide tubs for the rooms, which Moquete ordered in bulk from Kohler. When he went to install them, he couldn’t even fit them through the doors. The called-for kitchen cabinets were also too big. Moquete said he had to “extend the walls in the kitchen to make it fit by four inches.” 

In the construction business, differences between the work outlined in the original contract and the work that’s actually performed are referred to as “change orders.” Reordering bathtubs, resizing kitchen walls, and paying extra out of pocket to keep his crew on the jobsite during delays were all outside the original scope of Moquete’s contract, yet necessary to complete the agreed-upon work within it, and all examples of change orders. Moquete said he later discovered that ordering the bathroom supplies was not within his scope of contract.

“I asked repeatedly in the beginning of the job,” said Moquete, who said that Whittaker, Warren and Flament all indicated he had to order materials for the bathrooms. “I was like, ‘Shit, you know, three people are telling me I’m responsible’, so I went with it, and I bought the material.”

Moquete said it was only towards the end of the job that his attorney reviewed the contract and saw purchasing bathroom materials for the property was not included in his scope.

“I spent $160,000 of my own money on bath accessories that weren’t even my responsibility,” said Moquete. After submitting his requisition form for the bathroom materials, Haynes only approved a payment of $48,000.

“I did 81 bathrooms because some of the units had two full baths,” said Moquete. “So, there were three units with two full baths. You think $48,000 is gonna pay for toilets, faucets, towel bars, shower valves, medicine cabinets?”

Haynes’ refusal to pay change orders was one of three ways that Moquete said they “systematically bankrupt minority businesses.”

“Number one, they tell you, ‘Yeah, go ahead and do it,’ then they don’t pay change orders,” said Moquete. “Number two, they don’t pay on time. They wait past 90 days, or six months, and number three, they hold your retainer for a year, and they’re not supposed to do that.”

Moquete explained that retainers are a portion of payment held by general contractors to ensure the completion of work. When a job is finished, the general contractor goes down a checklist to ensure the subcontractors’ work is finished. By law, once the general contractor confirms that the subcontractor’s work is complete, the retainer is supposed to be released within 30 days. Moquete has heard, and another contractor who worked on NHAH II, Hector Rodrigues, also affirmed that Haynes has held subcontractors’ retainers for a year after work is complete.

Rodrigues, who runs an HVAC company, HR Heating, shared many of Moquete’s same complaints: delayed payments, being made to perform work outside the scope of his contract without reimbursement, and frequent delays. Rodrigues said the lack of timely pay forced him to use his credit card, dropped his credit score from 850 to 630, and left him $33,000 in debt. Rodrigues said he was paid $17,000 last month for work he and his crew completed in October.

“Why did I have to wait about six, seven months?” said Rodrigues. “They would give me a check every 45 days for $26,000. By the time they gave me that check, I’d owe $30,000.”

Though the project ended on April 10, Rodrigues said he is still waiting for his $26,000 retainer to be released. Rodrigues was told that Haynes puts their subcontractors’ retainers in a certificate of deposit “just to make money,” and the subcontractors must wait a year after the job is completed for the CD to mature. Moquete said a former Haynes employee told him the same. If true, this is wholly illegal, as prompt payment laws require general contractors to pay retainers within a month of a job’s completion.

“They’re ripping off people,” said Rodrigues.

Both Moquete and Rodrigues said that the issue of non-payment affects not only minority contractors, but vendors as well. After Rodrigues purchased “$13,000-$14,000” on boilers and maxed out his line of credit, he told Millennium Realty that he would need access to their credit account to keep the project moving.

“That’s when I wasn’t getting paid for the change orders,” said Rodrigues. “Whatever I needed for the boilers, you know, I would go to F.W.  Webb [HVAC supplier] on the Millennium account. But sometimes I couldn’t even buy anything because the Millennium account was closed too, because they hadn’t made a payment, and so I couldn’t buy anything, so I couldn’t keep going.”

When Moquete went to pick up a check from Haynes at their office in Seymour, he found himself waiting in the lobby with a vendor.

“He looked upset, and I looked upset,” said Moquete. “I’m in the lobby with this guy, and I said, ‘Hey, how’s it going with Haynes?’ And he says, ‘Horrible.’ I said, ‘Why? What happened?’ ‘They haven’t paid me.’ I said, ‘You too?’ He said, ‘Yeah, they owe me a shitload of money, and I had to cut them off.’”

The vendor told Moquete he was a door supplier.

“I said, ‘Oh, you supply the doors?’” said Moquete. “No wonder I’m waiting on doors. I’m waiting on doors because they haven’t paid the door— I don’t know if it’s the same vendor, but not only [are they] not paying their contractors, [they’re] not paying their vendors!”

Moquete provided Inside Investigator with the names of six other minority contractors who either worked on NHAH II or on other Haynes-managed projects, that he said are still owed money. Moquete provided the dollar amounts allegedly owed for four of these six contractors, which added up to a total of $198,000. Inside Investigator attempted to contact these contractors to confirm. One returned our inquiry and confirmed they had frequently suffered delayed payment, but had recently been made whole. The subcontractor declined to comment for the article, for fear of retaliation. 

Inside Investigator reached Haynes for comment via both phone and email but did not receive a response.

How State Contracts (Should) Work

Every year, officials at the CHFA release tax credits and direct funding, worth tens of millions of dollars, to general contractors to construct or renovate affordable rental housing. In May 2025, the CHFA and Connecticut Department of Housing (DOH) announced that they had provided tax credits, loans, or both, to 12 projects across the state, boasting that these projects would either construct or preserve 1,279 housing units, 550 of which would be affordable to low- or middle-income residents.

“Every investment in affordable housing is an investment in stronger, more resilient communities,” said Seila Mosquera-Bruno, DOH Commissioner. “These developments reflect our commitment to preserve and expand housing options—whether it’s building new homes or adding quality affordable rentals.”

One of these projects was NHAH II. According to the DOH’s press release, NHAH II received a 4% Low Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC) from CHFA, as well as a total of $8.5 million in financing from CHFA and DOH, combined. An Excel sheet provided by Thomas listing DOH-funded construction projects for 2022-2024 shows that Haynes has received 9% LIHTCs from CHFA on seven projects. 

Per Sec. 49-41c of Connecticut’s General Statutes, general contractors on state-funded construction projects have 15 days after receiving state funds to pay SMBEs. As of July 1, 2025, the law was amended to apply the 15-day window to all subcontractors on state projects. As Moquete, Rodrigues and Thomas have repeatedly stressed, this is not happening.

The change to state law was one of several made by House Bill 7287, a biennial budget adjuster bill passed in 2025. Inspired by the findings of a state-commissioned study completed in 2024, which found the state to have failed to live up to its set-aside goals, some of the changes include: a replacement of the state’s set-aside goals with contract-specific, “spending allocation goals” determined by the Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities (CHRO), specific deadlines for submitting and approving contractors’ compliance plans, (formerly referred to as AAPs) which outline how they intend to reach these goals, and a mandate that makes failure to pay subcontractors on time a matter subject to CHRO investigation.

Spencer Hill, an attorney from CHRO’s Legal Division, said that these changes “have taken a tremendous amount of work and the coordination of work across multiple agencies.”

“The result is a program that rests on a strong legal and factual foundation, that provides strong oversight that balances obligations with burdens and does so in a way that will bring opportunities to businesses that have been shut out of state contracting for too long,” said Hill.

CHRO has been the enforcement body for violations of the state’s set-aside goals. Before the changes implemented by HB 7287, CHRO was supposed to withhold 2% of every contract until the general contractor submitted its AAP. After HB 7287, CHRO is supposed to hold onto the 2% until after the general contractor’s compliance plans are approved by CHRO, with the bill providing specific deadlines for submission and approval. Despite CHRO having the power to withhold this 2% and having had it for years, Thomas said CHRO never actually does so.

“CHRO sends multiple letters to these individuals [GCs], saying, ‘You have not completed your set-aside requirements for this job. Where is the information,’ and ‘You are in violation,’” said Thomas. “But you know what they [the GCs] do? They ignore it. Why? Because they don’t feel the CHRO got any teeth! Even after the end of the job, they turn around and still give them the 2% back.”

Thomas provided Inside Investigator with two examples of CHRO letters: one sent by CHRO on Aug. 29, 2023, to Masotti Electric, another sent on Aug. 5, 2020, to Spectrum Floors. Both letters follow the same format, stating that their respective projects are near completion and requesting, among other documentation, the amount of pay still owed to set-aside subcontractors and vendors, and the company’s 258a forms, which list the SMBEs hired for the project. While the start date for Masotti’s state project was listed as “to be provided,” Spectrum’s start date was Jan. 1, 2020. Thomas, who was cc’ed on the correspondence, said that, to this day, neither matter has been closed by CHRO.

“Why are you battling for six years?” asked Thomas. “Why are you even sending this paperwork out if you ain’t doing nothing about it?”

Furthermore, Thomas said that he spoke to Masotti’s representatives about the project and said they were “one of the people that told me that, ‘I can’t give none of this work out [to SMBE subcontractors].’”

“So, if you can’t give none of this work out, you lied on an affidavit that you were going to hire minority people,” said Thomas. “That in itself is a felony — a signed affidavit! So, if nobody’s adhering to your rules and regulations from CHRO, why are you here? What’s the point?”

Per HB 7287, contractors now have 45 days after the “substantial completion” of a contract to submit their contractor compliance reports. These reports must be approved by CHRO’s Commissioner within 120 days of their submission, and if CHRO “fails to approve, conditionally approve or disapprove” a plan within that timeline, it will be deemed “either approved or deficient without consequence.” 

When asked whether this change to state law gave Thomas any hope that CHRO would enforce it, he said “100% no.”

Thomas and Moquete said that CHRO officials have told them they lack the manpower, funding, and resources to properly enforce contract compliance. Thomas argued that if this is the case, then legislators should have taken some of the work off CHRO’s plate, not added more.

“I’m saying take the work away from CHRO and put it to the Attorney General,” said Thomas. “People have lost trust in CHRO.”

In the past, Inside Investigator has also noted cases in which CHRO has lost paperwork, evidence, and cell messages. Moquete shared with Inside Investigator his own CHRO complaint, which he filed on April 15. He said he still has not received a response.

Thomas gave a list of policy demands he’d like to see enacted. He argued that state officials ought to create “true” set-aside funds for minority contractors, setting a concrete dollar amount to disburse only to SMBEs over the next five to ten years, to counteract the millions of dollars SMBEs have “lost out on.”

“There should be restorative justice of some form,” said Thomas.

He also argued for full financial transparency for state construction contracts. Moquete, Thomas and Hernandes said every general contractor uses the same excuse to delay or deny payment: “We’re still waiting to be paid.” While HB 7287 allows CHRO to audit general contractors’ payments on state projects, Thomas said that financial transparency should be afforded to everyone.

“If the owners pay the GCs for the subcontractors doing the work, the subcontractors need to see the paperwork stating that it went in, because the GCs are playing games on not paying individuals until two to three months down the road, or sometimes not even at all,” said Thomas. “There’s no way to check it, and if they’re state jobs, it should be open to where a subcontractor can see that information.”

When asked if CHFA would support a financial transparency measure, Martin said that CHFA would support “any measures that assist in the achievement of its mission to create and preserve affordable housing for the residents of Connecticut.”

Thomas believes general contractors who fail to meet set-aside goals should be fined, and that those with a record of delaying or failing to pay their subcontractors should be barred from receiving future state contracts. 

“It’s the state’s dollars; that’s taxpayer money,” said Thomas. “And if the dollars are not being handled correctly, somebody needs to be held responsible for it.”

Martin said the CHFA’s Quality Allocation Plan, the means by which it decides which developers to award LIHTC, requires CHFA’s approval of “each member of a borrower/developer’s ‘qualified development team,’ which includes the general contractor.” She explained that part of making these determinations is the GC’s past performance on “CHFA or other construction projects and requires that all of the general contractors’ necessary licenses and approvals be in good standing.”

“If CHFA were notified of “repeat bad faith” actors as you have cited, CHFA would respond based on the specifics of any situation,” said Martin. “However, CHFA is unaware of any such instances at this time.”

HB 7287 mandates that any state agencies that suspect a contractor has “willfully violated” the spending allocation goals for a project must notify the contractor of the violation and hold a hearing, and if they find them to have done so, “suspend all contract payments to the contractor or subcontractor and potentially issue a civil penalty.” Once again, Thomas said the law doesn’t matter if it isn’t enforced.

“For that process to happen, the awarding agency who awarded that GC the job is the one that’s supposed to take initiative,” said Thomas. “They don’t. They’re not doing it — some just don’t care and others don’t want the hassle.”

Before HB 7287’s passage, Thomas said that when general contractors failed to find enough SMBEs to hit the state’s set-aside goals, they were supposed to provide proof of “due diligence” to their awarding agencies, which they already didn’t do, and that agencies didn’t care if they did.

“They have to do what we call due diligence, that would be to notify me, notify the Minority Construction Council and any other minority contractor or other contracting groups, of what you’re looking for,” said Thomas. “That never happens. So, you have the awarding agency that doesn’t follow through with what they’re supposed to, and if the awarding agency doesn’t follow through, where does that process go? It actually goes nowhere.”

Hill, of CHRO, said that as of October 1, 2025, CHRO has begun “collecting information about all bids submitted on state projects,” to assess “who was getting an opportunity to bid on projects and who was getting passed over.” Just as developers have to bid for state funding or LIHTCs for state-funded housing projects, subcontractors must bid for work on them from GCs. In the past, minority contractors have complained that GCs have put out short bid timelines in a way that favors larger subcontractors over minority subcontractors, a complaint affirmed by Hill.

“We’ve seen large contractors get months to submit a bid for a project while small businesses were given days or weeks without any explanation as to why,” said Hill. “The Commission is collecting this information and, where there appear to be situations where small and minority-owned businesses aren’t given an equal opportunity, we are following up with contractors for explanations and disapprovals where necessary. “

At every point, Thomas indicated that changes to state law will only be as effective as they are enforced, and that the state’s prior enforcement efforts have left him with no hope that any new stipulations will be.

“I believe people should be held accountable,” said Thomas. “The system is supposed to be monitored by somebody; it’s not, that’s why people are doing what they’re doing.”

Hill said that CHRO “acknowledges that these changes are still going into effect and their impact is just starting to be felt,” but that it is “not a reflection of a lack of enforcement but the opposite — that the program is now more effective than it has been in years past due to the efforts of many both in and outside government.”

“We have encouraged contractors to join us in one of our many information sessions held around the state over the past several months or in our ongoing sessions,” said Hill. “The MCC has specifically joined us at some of these sessions where we have been steadfast in our support of them and our mutual goal of increasing opportunities for contractors in our state. We look forward to continue working with them and others as we continue to ensure the program is meeting the goal of ensuring contracts are awarded to the best businesses, no matter who they are.”

Lastly, Thomas and Moquete both argued that DOH and CHFA funding should be frozen until the state can adequately ensure that minority contractors receive their set-aside goals and that general contractors are not stiffing them. Harold Foley, an Atlanta-based minority housing developer who has accused the DOH of wrongly disbursing $100 million in excess funding to politically connected developers, has repeatedly called for the same in the past.

“We’re missing out on millions of dollars on a daily basis, and it should stop until we resolve this problem,” said Thomas. 

On July 20, Moquete sent a letter to CHFA, the State’s Appropriations, Government Oversight, Housing and Planning and Development Committees, and Bond Commission, echoing all of Thomas’s requests. Additionally, Moquete called on DAS to revise both its SMBE certification protocol, to stop set-aside dollars from going to “inappropriately certified” firms, and its prequalification process, which determines what firms can bid for projects. Moquete cited the 2024 set-aside study’s findings that the prequalification process’s “fees, bonding letters, and financial requirements” represented a “barrier to entry” for SMBEs.

Moquete called on each commission and committee to do their part in alleviating SMBEs’ concerns.

“Each of your bodies holds a distinct lever,” said Moquete.

He demanded the Appropriations Committee to condition DOH, CHFA, and DAS funding on “subcontractor payment tracking and an independent audit of the MBE certification roll.” He demanded the Government Oversight Committee hold a hearing into “DOH’s uncorrected set-aside monitoring failures, DAS’s certification of front firms and the concentration of state housing work in a small circle of general contractors.” He also demanded the Housing Committee pass laws mandating prompt-payment certification, change-order payment deadlines, public reporting of subcontractor payment performance, and to prefer releasing funds to construction-management projects, which he and Thomas asserted are inherently more financially transparent than those managed by GCs.

“The State cannot claim equity while its certification rolls are populated by fronts, its prequalification bars intended beneficiaries, its delivery model concentrates the work, and its payment practices convert minority subcontractors into interest-free lenders,” concluded Moquete. “The enclosed evidence — the State’s own audits, its own Disparity Study, its own payment standards, and a sworn Superior Court record — is concrete and current. I ask that you treat it with the seriousness your own findings already demand.”

Normando’s Future

On the advice of his lawyer, Moquete withdrew his suit against Haynes and brought it to arbitration. He’s been in discussions with Haynes since May 22, who have named $175,000 as their price and are “not budging,” said Moquete, who agreed to drop from his original asking price to $500,000.   

Moquete said that throughout arbitration, Haynes has tried to claim he left the job early for medical reasons. Moquete recently got a pacemaker put in, but said his surgery was done in June, a month after the job was finished. 

“There’s payroll proof, there’s payroll sheets, there’s checks, there’s camera footage, videos and pictures I took of the units on the last day,” said Moquete. “What Haynes is trying to do is discredit me due to my health condition, which is horrible.”

Behind the scenes, Moquete has been actively trying to rally legislative support behind his cause. He has met with Sen. Saud Anwar (D-East Hartford), as well as Reps. Derell Wilson (D-Norwich) and James Sánchez (D-Hartford). Thomas, who has advocated for years on the issues facing minority contractors, said it is ultimately on the Governor to ensure that the state’s policies are proactively enforced.

“The governor’s gonna tell you, ‘Well, I put the commissioner in, so it’s coming out of that commissioner’s place, they’re responsible,’” said Thomas. “But this has been going on for years! If the governor doesn’t have competent people to do the work, then it’s his responsibility to get rid of them and put competent people in.”

Since finishing his work on NHAH II, Moquete said he’s been able to secure further work with other housing authorities across the state, and that his “resume speaks for itself.” While he survived the financial duress he faced, he said he had to lay off employees to stay afloat and is “still bearing the load of the loss.”

“If it wasn’t for my client base, I’d be out of business,” said Moquete.  

While he still hopes to be sufficiently reimbursed, Moquete said the money is of less importance to him than ensuring the state adequately protects its minority contractors moving forward.

“I’m not a victim,” said Moquete. “I’m not trying to play the victim card; I’m trying to be an advocate. I’m just on the front lines.”

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