"In charge of selling the facilities for the Postal Service is CB Richard Ellis Group, one of the world's largest real estate companies, chaired by San Francisco financier Dick Blum. CBRE, which has worked with the post office since 1997, was awarded the exclusive contract to market Postal Service facilities in 2011. Blum is married to Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., a relationship some critics of the post office have duly noted.
"Historically, USPS has worked with multiple real estate service providers. The new contract enables USPS to consolidate these activities with one service provider," CBRE said in a statement at the time.
On its website, CBRE shows 57 post offices nationwide listed for sale or in the process of being sold. [...]
As for accusations of a conflict of interest and suspicions that Feinstein may have influenced the awarding of the contract to her husband's firm, Feinstein's office strongly denies the charges.
"Sen. Feinstein is not involved with and does not discuss any of her husband's business decisions with him. Her husband's holdings are his separate personal property. Sen. Feinstein's assets are held in a blind trust. That arrangement has been in place since before she came to the Senate in 1992," said Brian Weiss, Feinstein's communications director. In 2012, Feinstein voted for an amendment to a postal reform bill that would have temporarily halted post office closings. The amendment was defeated in the House.
Both the Postal Service and CBRE insisted the 2011 contract was competitively bid. The Postal Service is an independent agency that reports to Congress, but there is no indication Congress plays any role in the awarding of contracts.
This is not the first time Blum's business dealings have led to accusations of cronyism. From Wikipedia:
Blum's wife, Senator Dianne Feinstein, has received scrutiny due to her husband's government contracts and extensive business dealings with China and her past votes on trade issues with the country. Blum has denied any wrongdoing, however.[3] Critics have argued that business contracts with the US government awarded to a company (Perini) controlled by Blum may raise a potential conflict-of-interest issue with the voting and policy activities of his wife.[4] URS Corp, which Blum had a substantial stake in, bought EG&G, a leading provider of technical services and management to the U.S. military, from The Carlyle Group in 2002; EG&G subsequently won a $600m defense contract.[1]
In 2009 it was reported that Blum's wife Sen. Dianne Feinstein introduced legislation to provide $25 billion in taxpayer money to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp, a government agency that had recently awarded her husband's real estate firm, CB Richard Ellis, what the Washington Timescalled "a lucrative contract to sell foreclosed properties at compensation rates higher than the industry norms."[5]
Dianne Feinstein, ranked in August 2012 as the 14th richest U.S. politician, has a net worth estimated to be $70 million."
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