"In an effort to promote transparency and accountability, the City of Ann Arbor is providing Purchase Card transaction data to let taxpayers know how their tax dollars are being spent. Purchase Card transaction information is updated monthly. The Purchase Card Program is part of Financial and Administrative Services Area."  - From the Purchase Card Transactions metadata, City of Ann Arbor.

Here's a look at some of this purchase card information, which shows spending from city employees during the course of their jobs. I've looked only at hardware store spending, which accounts for about 15% of the approximately $1.1 million in Pcard expenses from March 7, 2008 through Dec. 4, 2009. Note that these are preliminary results - there are over 9,000 transactions in the period under question, and it's possible that there are transactions that should be included in subtotals that are not listed here.

The city has a bid process for transactions greater than $3,000, and uses purchase cards to streamline smaller transactions. Small transactions add up when you do a lot of them, as the hardware store totals illustrate.

Building materials, construction, hardware stores

Lowe's: $89,338. Lowe's has two stores nearby, one in Pittsfield Township on Carpenter Road and one in Scio Township on Jackson Road. The Pittsfield store accounts for the single largest Pcard total, with $69,897.77 in this data set. Lowe's, founded in 1952, operates over 1,700 stores nationwide; its $47.2 billion in annual sales for 2009 put it second in the U.S. home improvement market behind only Home Depot.

Fingerle Lumber: $19,492. Fingerle has been in Ann Arbor since 1931; its lumber yard is on South Fifth Avenue, between downtown and Michigan Stadium.

Home Depot: $15,573. Most of these transactions are at the Home Depot on Carpenter Road. Home Depot is the largest hardware chain in the country; it grossed $66.2 billion in 2009, a decline of 7.2 percent from fiscal 2008.

Stadium Hardware: $13,343. This hardware store on Ann Arbor's West Side has been in business since 1962.

Ferguson Enterprises: $8,827. Ferguson sells plumbing supplies; it is also a supplier to the University of Michigan.

Anderson Paint Co.: $4,462. Anderson Paint was founded in 1951; its store is on West Stadium Boulevard. A previous location on West William Street is now the home of Ann Arbor State Bank.

Satterlund Supply: $3,607. Satterlund, at Mound Road and I-696 in Warren, is one of metro Detroit's largest suppliers of PVC pipe.

Ace Barnes Hardware: $3,032. Ted Barnes Sr. opened his first store in Dearborn in 1942; he moved the operation to Ann Arbor in 1958, and it is operated by the second, third, and fourth generations of the family.

Ypsilanti Allied Building: $1,821.

Conclusions and observations

The total of these expenses is $159,495. It is notable that Lowe's has more than half of the total; of this, the Carpenter Road store is the more popular, with a total of over $69,000 spent. If all of these purchases had been made on the same day, they would require City Council approval, in addition to Office of the Mayor/administrative approval. The whole point of efficient purchase card operations is to avoid lengthy approval processes for small transactions.

Some smaller transactions were nonetheless notable because they appear to be a sign that transactions were split across multiple purchases to avoid purchasing card limits. Look at these four transactions:

SUPERIOR GLASS BLOWING   	273.89	9/8/08
SUPERIOR GLASS BLOWING   	273.88	9/8/08
SUPERIOR GLASS BLOWING   	375.5	9/19/08
SUPERIOR GLASS BLOWING   	375.5	9/19/08
SUPERIOR GLASS BLOWING    Total	1298.77	

These have the hallmark of a purchase where two card charges were run instead of one to avoid being declined for a maximum charge.

The fiscal year 2009 audit noted purchases made by city employees in 2008 which were arranged to avoid purchasing card limits, notably a set of 11 flat screen television sets purchased for the Wheeler Service Center. The 2009 audit notes that controls have been put into place to prevent that from repeating.

Edward Vielmetti writes the FOIA Friday column for AnnArbor.com. Reach him at 734-330-2465.