The business given a no-bid contract to install a water-purification system in the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool is tied to a man who is a donor and Palm Beach neighbor of President Donald Trump, The New York Times and other media outlets have reported.
The reflecting pool — a centerpiece of Trump’s highly touted Washington, D.C., makeover — has turned into a spectacle of green water, peeling blue coating and political blame‑shifting. Roughly two weeks after a $14 million–$15 million renovation and “American flag blue” repainting, a massive algae bloom has turned the water lime green while the new surface flakes off in visible sheets.
National Park Service officials and scientists say the algae is a predictable mix of summer heat, shallow stagnant water and nutrient‑rich runoff, and are treating it with hydrogen peroxide and “nanobubble” aeration they describe as safe. Trump has blamed “vandalism,” claiming vandals used chemicals to damage the pool even as federal workers acknowledge the new coating is separating from the concrete on its own.
The water‑purification system was installed by Greenwater Services, an Ohio firm owned through the J.J. Cafaro Investment Trust, controlled by longtime Trump friend and donor John J. Cafaro, the Times reported.
The Times said the contract bypassed a competitive-bidding process typically required and gave a $1.7 million contract to the Greenwater Services firm.
Cafaro and his wife Janet live at 860 S. Ocean Blvd in Palm Beach, in a landmarked 1928 house known as Nuestro Paradiso and Casa Alegre, about a mile north of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago. According to the Palm Beach Daily News, Cafaro bought the house for $16 million through a trust in his name in 2007. His wife now owns it in a trust in her name.
In February, the Palm Beach Town Council approved a variance to allow a cabana to be built on the oceanside slip of land that is part of the Cafaro estate.
The estate — with its Mediterranean revival mansion designed by architect Julius Jacobs — was landmarked by Palm Beach in 1991, town records show. The 1.5-acre property has a 150-foot-long stretch of beachfront, which is separated from the main portion of the estate by South Ocean Boulevard.
The mansion sits just outside of the security zone established when Trump visits his nearby Mar-a-Lago Club.
Here are renderings of the beach cabana and landscape changes proposed:
John Cafaro had donated to Trump’s charity before his first term
John Cafaro contributed $50,000 in 2016 to Trump’s private charity, USA TODAY reported in 2017, citing tax filings.
USA TODAY said Joe Bell, a spokesman for the Cafaro company, said he believed the contribution was made by the company’s retired head.
Trump’s private charity had reached its highest point in almost a decade, nearly $3 million, as he ran a winning campaign for the White House in 2016.
Trump says pool probably needs to be drained for repairs, blames ‘Vandals’
Trump said in a social media post Saturday, June 20, the reflecting pool “probably” needs to be drained to make additional repairs, a move he blamed on “terrible Vandals,” many of whom, he said, had been arrested.
“What these terrible Vandals have done is a true affront to both Presidents George Washington and Abraham Lincoln, and should be dealt with accordingly,” Trump said in the post.
Trump said “many additional people have been arrested” in connection to the “disgraceful Vandalism of our beautiful Reflecting Pool.”
After meeting with contractors, the president said the pool, which had “worked perfectly,” had been severely damaged by corrosive and destructive chemicals poured into it in addition to a “gash” in its surface.
“What they have damaged does not even include the earlier killing of a large amount of grass which was, by far, the least of it,” Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social. “They took some form of knife or blade, and put a 250 foot long gash into the beautiful facade of what took so much work, competence, and money to build and complete.”
John Bisognano is Executive Editor of The Palm Beach Post. He can be reached at jbisognano@pbpost.com.
This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Firm that got no-bid pool contract tied to Trump’s Mar-a-Lago neighbor
Reporting by John Bisognano and Kristina Webb, Palm Beach Post / Palm Beach Post
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By John Bisognano and Kristina Webb, Palm Beach Post | USA TODAY Network
