Dive Brief:

• As it tries to recover misspent money, Bell, California, is suing a construction company that it says was illegally paid $3.2 million.
• McCullah Construction Co., based in nearby Bell Gardens, was paid from Bell's funds from 2005 to 2010 on the sole authorization of former City Manager Robert Rizzo, who is serving a 12-year prison term for his no-contest plea to 69 counts of corruption.
• McCullah worked on Rizzo's home in Huntington Beach in 2009, though Rizzo's attorney says he, not the city, paid for the work.

Dive Insight:

Soaring salaries for city council members helped ruin the working-class city financially. Along with suing McCullah, the city is looking to get money back from the only councilman who was not convicted of corruption, and from a foundation that was run by a councilmen that the city says was overpaid for providing senior-citizen transportation.