Richard Tarrant

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Richard Tarrant on the campaign trail.

Richard Edward Tarrant, (born August 6, 1942 in Newark, New Jersey) is an American businessman and politician. Most recently, he was the Republican nominee for U.S. Senator from the state of Vermont (see Vermont United States Senate election, 2006) in 2006, but lost the election to Representative Bernie Sanders.

1 Early life
2 Business career
3 Philanthropy
4 2006 campaign for U.S. Senate
5 The Renaissance Project at Fletcher Allen
6 External links

[edit] Early life

Tarrant graduated from Saint Michael's College in 1965 with a bachelor's degree in Mathematics. He majored in counting on his fingers (see photo). In college he was a first-team All-America in basketball and led the Purple Knights to the Final Four of the 1965 NCAA Division II Basketball Tournament, where they were defeated 93-70 by the University of Evansville, who had Jerry Sloan and Larry Humes, both All-Americans. He was drafted by the world champion Boston Celtics, but was cut before the first game of the season. He went to work for IBM in Burlington, Vermont selling computer equipment to the northern part of the state.

[edit] Business career

In 1969, using funds from a Small Business Administration loan, founded Burlington Data Processing (BDP) corporation, along with partners Robert Hoehl and, later, Paul Egerman. BDP initially did payroll and claims processing for physicians. The company changed its name to Interpretive Data System (IDS) and later to IDX Systems Corporation.

At the time of its sale to General Electric, IDX had thousands of contracts in doctors offices across the country, in addition, to providing the computer technology for much of the United Kingdom's medical centers.

Between 1995 and 2005, Tarrant was the chairman of the board of IDX. In 2005, IDX was purchased by General Electric for $1.2 billion. After the sale, he moved to a gated community in Florida and purchased a Bentley. However, in order to run for office in Vermont, he changed his legal residence to Vermont. He currently "resides" in Colchester, VT with his wife where he works on his charity foundation.

In addition, Tarrant served as a member of the University of Vermont's Board of Trustees for several years and on the Saint Michael's College Board of Trustees. Tarrant personally donated money to Saint Michael's and in response, the college built an Athletic Center in his name.

[edit] Philanthropy

Tarrant and his wife have created the Richard E. and Deborah L. Tarrant Foundation [1], which make grants intended to enrich the quality of life and communities throughout Vermont. According to the organization's website, "Our primary areas of focus are basic human services, education and community-based grantmaking." In 2005 the foundation was listed by The Grantsmanship Center [2] as one of the top 40 Vermont foundations in charitable giving. It is worth noting, however, that the foundation is prohibited from making any donations to pro-choice groups.

Most recently, Tarrant's foundation invested in the Milton public school system where they provided monetary support for a pilot program that gave students an opportunity to learn at different paces. This has been called Home School at School.

[edit] 2006 campaign for U.S. Senate

Main article: Vermont United States Senate election, 2006

In 2005, Tarrant announced his candidacy for the US Senate seat vacated by the retirement of Senator Jim Jeffords (I-Vermont). On September 12, 2006, he won the Republican nomination, defeating USAF Lt. Col. Greg Parke and marijuana legalization activist Cris Ericson. Tarrant faced Independent Representative Bernie Sanders in the November general election. Sanders, who won the Democratic nomination but ran as an Independent, defeated Tarrant by an overwhelming margin. The race proved to be the most expensive race in Vermont history with both candidates spending close to $13 million. Tarrant spent roughly $7 million of his own money in the race and Sanders raised roughly $6.5 million and spent most of it. Tarrant's campaign was remarkable for its saturation of radio and television with a serial biography of the candidate. Later, the campaign turned strongly negative, with attacks on Sanders' voting record.

[edit] The Renaissance Project at Fletcher Allen

In January 2005, William Boettcher, former chief executive officer of Vermont's Fletcher Allen Health Care, pleaded guilty to federal conspiracy charges, admitting that he hid the real costs of the hospital's $367 million expansion -- dubbed the Renaissance Project -- from state regulators. Prosecutors said Boettcher and other top hospital officials created two budgets for the Renaissance Project -- one for state regulators and the Fletcher Allen board that showed the project coming in on budget at $173 million -- and another that reflected the project's true costs, which had actually increased to more than $250 million. Prosecutors also said Boettcher and conspirators concealed from Fletcher Allen trustees the full cost of the hospital's agreement with the University of Vermont to develop the education center component of the expansion project. Thad Krupka, the hospital's former chief operating officer, pleaded guilty in the fall of 2004 to three misdemeanor false claim counts.[3]

Tarrant was a member of the hospital's board of trustees from 2000 to 2003, and a member of the Finance and the Planning committees.

On February 12, 2003, Governor Jim Douglas met with Fletcher Allen representatives and asked for the resignation of all but the newest trustees.

On February 13, 2003, eight trustees resigned, including Tarrant. [4]

In 2003, Tarrant wrote an opinion piece in the Burlington Free Press in which he said "No one can justly accuse Fletcher Allen of hiding the true cost of the project."[5] Tarrant later acknowledged in a sworn statement to federal prosecutors that this was wrong. In June 2006 he publicly said, "One mistake I made in that op-ed was saying no one can rightly accuse" anyone of wrongdoing in the Fletcher Allen scandal.[6].