Legislative Joint Auditing-Counties and Municipalities
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Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
12:30
We want to welcome you all today to the legislative audit meeting for counties and cities. Could we stand for a prayer? Senator Stone, could we say the prayer for us, sir? Righteous Lord, we just want to come before you
Senator Matt Stone
Unverified
12:53
today. We just thank your opportunity that we live in a free country where we can live in the city.
Speaker 6
13:00
I just pray that everything that's said and done here today will be pleasing to you. I just ask these things in Jesus'
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
13:11
name. Amen. Amen. All right. Okay, our adoption of minutes of May 11th. Does anyone want to make a motion to accept that? Okay, Mr. Crowley. All those second. I need a second. Okay. Got a second by Senator Gilmore. All those in favor say aye. Aye.
Opposed say no. All right. Now this works us down to the city of Augusta. And Mr. Jones has a recap that we need to go over to kind of know where we're
at with this situation. Thank you, Mr. Chair. All right, is that on my own? You're done. How
Speaker 15
13:55
about that? Nope. Okay, all right, here we go.
Speaker 16
14:06
Just a little recap on the situation with the city of Augusta. The city of Augusta hasn't had a private audit
Speaker 17
14:14
since 2016. cities have the option to obtain a private audit if they would like and not use legislative audit and about 40 of the 500 cities elect to do that and so augusta is one of those and we send a reminder a legislative audit staff sends a reminder to the cities when they we haven't received a
copy of their audit and so we sent reminders several times but the last one was back in the winter in february i believe and a copy of that letter made its way to the deputy prosecuting attorney who sent a letter to to us which we're required to take to the executive committee of
Speaker 16
15:00
joint audit and last month at the may executive committee meeting the they voted to have the city
Speaker 17
15:09
officials from Augusta to invite the mayor and the city council to come to this meeting the standing committee on counties municipalities and explain why they haven't obtained an audit and so that that's the background on why we're
Speaker 18
15:24
here today and what I know from the sign-in sheets the mayor and several of the city council members are here to to answer those questions
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
15:41
excuse me yes thank you mr jones um city of augusta uh are you all here to speak
Senator Ben Gilmore
Unverified
15:49
sir need to hit your okay and can we have some of
Speaker 31
16:24
the city council members to the table as well for questions Yes, sir.
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
16:35
yeah who is who is here to speak first all right sir what who are you sir and what
position do you hold at the city of Augusta and kind of give us a brief
Speaker 40
17:03
on this all right thank you I'm mayor Jeff Collins of Augusta and I'm here to
explain and answer any questions I can on where we are at now the auditors we had before were Howlin North and in when I got in office in 2019 in July of 2019 is when I received the notice that 2016 had been finished, the audit. And when 2020 rolled around, I'm wondering where 2017 is. And when I start questioning the auditors, he is telling us that he's having a problem with staff at this time
and getting ours done. And then, of course, COVID hit in 20, and then things slowed down a little bit. Well, in 21, we went back to the table and decided to hire a new auditor. And so in September of 21, we signed a letter of agreement with a new auditor. And right now, we're working with EGP here out of Little Rock and Bryan, I believe. And they are waiting to check compliances for 2017, and it will be finished.
And they are working on 2018. And the agreement we had with them, they were going to try to give us two years every year until we were caught up. And that's where we're at now. We do have a new auditor, and they are working on it as we speak now.
Speaker 45
18:29
Mr. Jones, do you want to give us a little bit of something about those audits?
Speaker 16
18:36
Well, they haven't been submitted yet, so they're working on those. So when they finish them, they're required to send them to us within 30 days,
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
18:44
and we'll be able to give you the update when we get those. Does
anyone else care to speak about this? Go ahead, sir. Be sure, sir,
Speaker 51
19:04
and identify yourself. How about now? There we go. I'm Perry Galloway, an alderman of the city of Augusta,
Speaker 52
19:09
a city council member for, I think, 14 years.
I've never seen anything like this. uh me myself along with others are direly concerned about the financial stability of the city of augusta we need help we need help from the state we don't need help from a private auditor we need we need somebody to step in look at all our books we were notified i went back to january 14th of 2021 for a letter dated saying we were delinquent on uh several years i don't haven't run on but
three or four years we're also notified again on march 26 october 31st april 27th august 13th of
Speaker 53
19:55
uh of 19 and 20 and now here we are today in june
Speaker 52
20:02
of 2023 because somebody's finally pushed the issue um you know we've got a lot of problems at augusta We really do. We've got, seem to have spending out of control, no regards to budgets.
Speaker 57
20:29
I think Senator Gill. As a council member. place he's
Speaker 39
20:40
saying he received something in 2021 exactly right and that's when we hired a new auditor and and yeah the city council can
Speaker 60
20:50
go and they can vote keep the mayor okay folks let's limit it to one
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
20:55
person speaking at a time okay would you like me to go on um
Speaker 52
21:05
So, we've got budget issues, we've got spending with no regards to budgets, we need help. As a council member, I have a fiduciary responsibility to the citizens of the City of Augusta. You know, currently there was a FOIA submitted for information back on the 12th of May and it's gone essentially unanswered. They had three days to comply or respond and it's gone
unanswered up until yesterday. They were self-submitted, which was just kind of fodder. So that's pending a lawsuit against the city in violation of FOIA rules. We've got a lot of issues and all I can say, I'm reiterating, is we need help. We need a state audit. We don't need a private audit who we're giving the auditor information to audit for us. We need somebody to come in and actually look at the books, come to our office, I assume, and how that works, and go through the books for the city of Augusta.
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
22:11
We need help. Okay. Mr. Jones, is there anything that you could say that would open a light up for
Speaker 17
22:25
this, for what the state actually could do? the way the way the process works is um when when a city has taken on doing a private audit there is a request made to the the executive committee of the legislative joint audit committee and usually that request comes from the mayor and the city council and the the committee
considers that request, and the executive committee is the one who they have the approval power to do that. So that's how that worked, that the request
Speaker 16
23:00
would need to go to the executive committee of legislative audit. Could I ask you
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
23:07
guys something? Has the rest of the city council,
are they going along? Which direction are they trying to go as a whole? Do you know?
Speaker 68
23:21
I can't speak for anyone by myself. I'm certainly in favor of a
Speaker 52
23:26
state audit. So I don't know. I mean, I think someone mentioned earlier that the prosecutor actually brought this to someone's attention. So, you know, that ought to have some sort of, I don't know, precedence If the prosecutor thinks it's time for the state to look into the business of Augusta, I mean, what takes place there?
Speaker 17
23:54
Okay. We did receive, we received a letter from the prosecutor. Now, the way it works is when we, prosecutors asked us to look into criminal matters, and that's, those are the requests that go to the committee from the prosecutor. We did take the letter to the committee, and that was pointed out to the committee is that usually when we're going to take over the normal audit, the city council has voted for us to do so. In this case, the prosecutor was asking us to do the audits, just the normal audits.
And so that would be the difference here. And I will point out there was a legislation passed in this last session that it will take effect on June 30, 2024, that this committee has the authority to withhold turn back for cities who don't submit their private audits within 18 months of the fiscal year end. And so those are two things to consider, I think, everybody here. But, you know, if the city council voted to ask us to do the audit
and sent that request to the executive committee, they would listen to that in a different way. If the prosecutor was asking us to look into criminal matters and they knew there
Speaker 16
25:16
was money missing, usually the committee sends us in to look at those pretty quickly. Let me ask you
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
25:26
this. Is this basically what y'all are looking for? So you all
want this as a whole to happen?
Speaker 70
25:37
Okay. Oh, that's right. Senator Gilmore, you had your hand a while
Speaker 72
25:42
ago. Yeah, thank you, Mr. Chair. All right, is
Senator Ben Gilmore
Unverified
25:51
my mic on now? There we go. Thank you, Mr. Chair. So I think it would be helpful, since we have the city council and the mayor and everyone here, I'd like to go one at a time, maybe with the council, and work our way around, since we've already heard from the mayor, as to what are the issues, because I think what we've heard is maybe some speaking in riddles
and other things, not actually speaking to the issues. So I'd like to hear exactly what are some of the concerns that you're concerned about. Because it sounds like there's a lot of issues, so let's
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
26:28
hear those. Give me Yes sir Let me ask you this folks Could you all identify who y'all are Before we start speaking Alderman Chris Eldridge
Yes sir What about you sir do you want to speak and I need
to know who you are. Alderman Jimmy Youngman. Okay, well, you
know, we've got a motion by Senator Gilmore that we let each one of you guys speak about the situation, so we'll start on the left and work our way to the right. Is that okay, Senator Gilmore?
Speaker 52
27:14
Okay, sir. All right, sir. so i'm you're left okay uh so i've got a copy of this for you and i'll go there's 27 items uh budgets uh correspondence between the mayor and the mayor's office concerning any city employees non-pay non-payment of municipal utility bills uh this includes but not limited to the mayor's relative uh corresponds between the mayor and the mayor's office and the treasurer
of the city of augusta and we do not have a treasurer we have not had a treasurer in a year and a half at least he resigned because of frustrations and we don't have a city attorney either for the same reasons uh documentation of all city purchases and amounts exceeding 10 000 along with copies of council minutes approving said purchases for any bids i think the issue there is we're just spending money without getting uh bids uh copies of any requests
from the mayor mayor's office city vendors seeking vendors vendors to split invoices or to establish a payment plan for purchases by the city uh ending all records relating to the sale of city property this includes but not limited cash deposits of monetary proceeds from the sale of scrap metal or similar materials, any and all correspondence between the mayor and the mayor's office concerning recycling, all city employee pay records and time cards for the last two years, including records of employee vacation time and taking sick leave, any records of purchases of bids
for recycling equipment, including council approval for any such purchases. As I stated earlier, I'm 14 years into this, and I don't recall any approval for enlarged purchases. Records of deposits for recycling material sales. Any of all records of the use expenditures or dispersal of the American Rescue Funds received by the City of Augusta. Copies of all credit card bills and proof of payment receipts for payment of credit card bills.
Copies of any and all documentation, recording reimbursement to the mayor or payment of the mayor's cell phone bills. All records of purchase and payments by the city of Augusta to the White River Cafe. Records of any and all businesses or monetary transaction between the city of Augusta and relatives of the administration. All documentation regarding the overdraft of any city bank account. And I thought I may have brought one with me, but we're overdrawn over the majority of the month in every count we have.
City fuel expenses, records of all monetary payment and compensation paid to the mayor. The budget is $30,000 salary for the mayor. He received a little more than that that's documented. And I questioned it, and he said, well, everybody else got a 3% raise. I get one, too. We didn't vote on its elected position. It's spelled out in the position.
And $3,000 is not 3% of 30 where I went to school. Past due city accounts, receivables owing to the city of Augusta, copies of audits, which, you know, they don't exist, correspondence between the city and the treasurer, which we don't have a treasurer. Correspondence between the mayor and the city attorney. The city attorney resigned in the last few months.
City contracts, copies of W-2 forms, records of any loans made by the city of Augusta reflecting borrowing by the city of Augusta. So that's kind of what we're looking at the I think one of them was the accounts receivable for the utilities again I've been on this thing a long time it was always our past due was typically less than twenty thousand dollars uh recently it's been as high as 130 thousand because no one's paying
their bill they don't have to because we're not going to cut them off well hold on they should be cut off but it's not happening so there's a lot of frustration here and
Speaker 90
31:53
this i don't know what the rules and requirements are to get a state audit an intent state audit we need
Speaker 42
32:01
one badly thank you sir right down the line sir your name once again and Oh, I'm sorry.
Representative Lane Jean
Unverified
32:10
Representative Lane, go right ahead. To any of the city council, how many members do y'all have on the city council? There's eight of us. Eight of you. Four awards, two representatives per award. Okay, and we have three city council members here today. There's four in the room. There's four. Okay, all
Speaker 96
32:31
right. Thank you. Lane, is that all you need to bring up?
Speaker 97
32:41
Okay, Representative Jim, go right ahead,
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
32:49
sir. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I got it. Thank you. I should know this, but I kind of came into the meeting a little late. Is the mayor here? Okay. Okay. Okay. Very good. And then also at the end of the table here, we have three council members and we have one other council member here in attendance. Okay. I'm going to have some
questions here in just a little bit, but Mr. Chairman, I don't know, it sounded like you weren't going to recognize these other council members and let them kind of speak their piece, but I certainly have some questions. I have some very serious concerns about uh what's going on here so with that uh at the appropriate time i'd like to be recognized thank you
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
33:34
representative jim don't let us slip by that before this
is over with because this may last a little while uh next person please alderman eldridge i
Speaker 103
33:47
don't have a whole lot to add to that
Mr. Galloway did an excellent job, but I would reiterate that we do need the help. I think everybody would invite a state audit. I really do. I think that we could pass that in a council meeting and look forward to doing that. Mr. Youngman Go ahead, Representative Blaney Thank you, Mr. Chair
Speaker 106
34:25
I'll direct this to the Mayor Are the records there for an audit for five years? Are they there? Yes Are they there and available for an audit? The records for the past five years? Oh, yes. Yes. Okay.
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
34:46
All right. That's all I have. Thank you,
Representative Landy. Anyone else that has any questions, go ahead, Representative Stave. Representative Landy will get you right in here next.
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
34:58
There we go. So my question is, is the problems that you're seeing, is it a lack of training? Is it we're just not working together? Is it fraud? What do y'all think the root cause of the issues are that y'all are having? And that's to whoever wants to take a stab at that. I don't know that anyone knows the answer to
Speaker 116
35:19
any of those questions, to be honest with you. So we don't know if
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
35:25
it's lack of training, if it's fraud, or if it's just...
It could be lack of training. Or if
Speaker 116
35:33
it's just, you know... All of the above. Who knows? I
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
35:49
do not know. Thank you, Mr. Chair. As a follow-up on Representative Fite's question, I don't remember exactly what date you thought that this private auditor was going to be able to bring your audits current, but if
If all the records are there, I'm kind of curious why it's taken them so long to get it done. The auditors, you know, they generally work pretty quick.
Speaker 40
36:12
Right. I can't speak for them. I can't speak for the
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
36:16
auditors. Well, then tell me again when they said they would bring you current.
Speaker 40
36:21
Well, they agreed to us that they could get us two a year, two audits a year. And they started on 17, and they started in 21, and it was late
Speaker 39
36:31
21. We had to get all the records to them, and I know they have 20 and 21 down there now.
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
36:40
Just one other question. What's the population of Augusta? 1,700, 1,800. Thank you. Anyone else have a question they want
Representative David Ray
Unverified
36:58
to bring up at this time? Go ahead, Representative David. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And my question is for Mr.
Jones with legislative audit. How long has it been since the city of Augusta has
Speaker 129
37:10
had an audit? The last report we have is 2016.
Representative David Ray
Unverified
37:13
Okay. I have a couple
questions for the mayor then, if that's okay. So, Mr. Mayor, you mentioned that you have hired a private audit company to perform the city's audits, is that right? Yes, sir. And you recently switched to a different
company? Well, no. When I took office,
Speaker 40
37:38
a long time, and he lost several employees, and with lack of communication, he just kept trying to hire employees to get us covered,
Speaker 39
37:47
but he kept falling behind. And when we got so far behind, I had to hire another audit. So
Representative David Ray
Unverified
37:55
when were you elected mayor? 2019. okay um so what what's the what's the budget for the city of augusta or we
Speaker 39
38:05
have utility and what general and street what's the what's the
Representative David Ray
Unverified
38:11
total budget i mean how much revenue does the city
Speaker 134
38:17
bring in one something one over over four million dollars okay
Representative David Ray
Unverified
38:23
three three something three nine how and how
How much have you committed to pay a private auditor to do these audits to get you up to date? I think it's between $30 and $50. Okay. Okay. So what was your thought process or decision-making behind going the route of choosing a private auditor as opposed to having the state
do it? Well, I mean, that's what option I had
Speaker 40
38:46
available to me. I mean, I'm not opposed to a state coming in and doing it. I'd love for them to. I'd love to put this smoke out. There's no fire. There's no fraud.
You're not going to find what they want you to find. Yes, we are behind. And I have addressed, understandably, to an extent, why we are behind. We wouldn't quite give the right answers from our old auditor. He didn't want to lose our business, and he kept trying to bring somebody on board to get us caught up. But there comes a time when we couldn't wait no more. And that's where we're at. But, I mean, yes, I'd love for the council to vote if that's what it would take for the state to come in.
Speaker 141
39:29
We can do that at the June meeting if it's feasible, or if y'all can just
Representative David Ray
Unverified
39:34
take it now. Well, it sounds like everybody at the table is in agreement that y'all would want the state to perform an audit. I guess I wonder why that hasn't been done before now.
Speaker 144
39:46
Well, I don't know. Okay, that's all I've got. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Okay, thank you, Representative David. We were told at one time that
Speaker 17
39:54
the state couldn't do our utilities. that is correct we don't do water and sewer audits you you would have to
hire a private firm to do that part of it anyway representative
Speaker 147
40:11
fact mayor i i'm in my 25th year in government and i've never heard of a city going five years without an audit. Yes, sir. Never. Yes, sir. And it starts with you in taking care of this problem. Yes, sir. And five years into this is way too long to solve this issue that we have right now.
Speaker 60
40:32
Well, I started in 20. It was very hard to find an auditor in 20
Speaker 133
40:39
do you operate without a treasurer? I would love to have one. Treasurer is an elected position. Somebody
Speaker 141
40:46
can come up and file and run any time or anybody that wants it. Is it
Speaker 150
40:51
elected officer or is it appointed? It
Speaker 40
40:53
is. We can appoint. I mean, if somebody would come up and say, I want to be your treasurer and they're qualified, they're
Speaker 147
40:59
in. Who takes care of those responsibilities now?
Speaker 39
41:03
Our city clerk. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Chair. That's the same with an attorney. I mean, the attorney left because he won the
Speaker 40
41:12
election for the city. of Searcy, attorney for the city of Searcy. And so he left. He didn't resign under any circumstances. He left to go to the city of Searcy. And, I mean, we'd love to have an attorney step up right now. Senator Gilmore. Thank you,
Senator Ben Gilmore
Unverified
41:31
Mr. Chair. I think it would be helpful just to talk process for a second
if we could get staff to sort of explain. And so I guess all of us members know what the process is for the state to do the auditing. So my understanding, the Executive Committee of Legislative Audit would vote
Speaker 16
41:57
deem it appropriate. Yes, a letter would be submitted to the Executive Committee. We usually like for there to be a vote of the council
because they've made the choice before to have a private audit and so that's did they would write a letter to mr norman he
Speaker 46
42:17
would take it to the executive executive committee and they would consider it there and
Senator Ben Gilmore
Unverified
42:23
just by way of follow up just hearing some of the conversation um about when when there was a last audit done and the concerns about records maybe not even being available um i don't know if y'all have
any sort of information of whether it's even audible at this point as probably too much to even get y'all to speak to I would
Speaker 17
42:47
assume. Yeah yes we haven't seen the records so we couldn't really begin to answer that question. We would have a lot of work to do on the front end before we could get started and we're a little bit behind anyway but yes but that's the process that there would be a letter that goes to the executive committee and they decide. Thank you.
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
43:10
Senator Johnson, I know you have something you need to inject into
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
43:19
this situation. Thank you, Mr. Chair. In this, I'll start with Mr. Jones because I think we need to kind of work back as a follow-up to Senator Gilmore's question. Mr. Jones, could this subcommittee by motion request that I'd say we would waive the requirement but that a letter signed by a majority of the city council could be sent to Mr. Norman
and initiate that process rather than having to do a resolution and have a meeting and all that. Just something that indicates that a majority of the governing body wants us, meaning the state, to conduct the audit. And it's kind of a core layer to that. Correct me if I'm wrong. It's my understanding that Legislative Audit would do the audit unless the city has opted for a private auditor. We are the default organization that would do the municipal audit.
Speaker 16
44:17
Is that correct? I know I hit you with two questions. Right. The answer is you can pass what you want to, and you can make that request of the executive committee. now they have things that they consider most of the time the process we ask the cities to become current before we take them on so like right now if in most cases this is a this is a different
case not not many places are years behind multiple years
Speaker 17
44:51
behind is that we usually would ask them to get their audits current through 2022 then we could take them on because it has
Speaker 16
45:01
to do with staffing and planning and so forth. But ultimately, it's the executive committee's decision.
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
45:07
Okay, which I'm going to
go out on a limb here. I feel that this subcommittee's feeling is probably similar to what the executive committee would be, is that we need to do
something. And gentlemen, I do hear you say, quote unquote, we need help, unquote. And we want to help, but we also have procedures we have to follow, and I want to remind you, is it in 18 months, Mr. Jones, the new law takes effect, that if you aren't current on this, you lose 100% of your state turn back, both your general fund turn back and your road turn back, and I would bet that that would not be a good thing in Augusta.
It wouldn't be a good thing in Little Rock or North Little Rock either, so I can imagine what it is in a smaller community. So we have to fix this, and I think you all understand. And I would ask the committee for any discussion on it from this standpoint. I think we may be looking at more than just counting the numbers and the books balancing, but we may have some compliance with other state laws. And I'm glad to see our full committee chairman raising his hand. And so, Chairman Rye, I would now defer to you recognizing Chairman
Gassaway because I think he's ready to say something.
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
46:30
Representative Jim, could you give us your input on
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
46:38
this one? Thank you, Mr. Chairman. So I think Senator Johnson makes a fair point for this subcommittee to consider what to do. But at the same time, you asked for my opinion on this, so I'm going to give it to you. I think from a legislative audit standpoint, that's a significant commitment of time and resources to have to go back and audit six years' worth of city business that's been unaccounted for.
And legislative audit is busy, is extremely busy auditing all of the institutions and agencies that they're required to audit by law. I'm not sure that we should be so quick to devote all of the time and resources of legislative audit to go fix a mess that wasn't our problem or their problem. What may be more appropriate, and I think for this committee to consider, is if you were going to do a private audit that, you know, you created this problem,
you can pay to fix this problem, which would be to have the city audited by private audit and submit that to legislative audit for review. If there is some question about whether or not there's been any fraud or misuse, that's a much easier audit, I think, for legislative audit to go in and maybe look and check for those things. But if you're talking about a full audit for five or six years and devoting the time and resources of legislative audit to do that when it was the city who created this problem, it really should be the city's obligation to correct this problem
before we necessarily devote all of legislative audit's time and effort. So I would just say before we just jumped any conclusion to ask legislative audit to fix this mess that we consider putting that burden on the city since they're the ones who created this mess to begin with. So that would be my first point. And then I do have several questions, Mr. Chairman.
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
48:35
Okay. Thank you, Representative. Let me ask you this, Mr. Jones. In a situation like this, it's
probably at least six or seven years old.
Do we have the sole authority to give them a
Speaker 16
48:55
time frame to get this finished? Well, on June 30, 2024, the law says they're supposed to have through 2022 completed.
Speaker 17
49:04
or this committee would have the discretion to withhold their turn back. So it's kind of in the law, I guess, is what I would say.
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
49:18
We're kind of in a limbo state until the situation occurs next year, I would say. As
Speaker 146
49:28
far as withholding their turn back, yes. Okay,
Speaker 96
49:33
Representative Lane, would you like to speak here,
Representative Lane Jean
Unverified
49:40
sir? To the mayor of the city council, because I heard, I think, one of you say that we're overdrawn about half the month.
Do we have the funds to pay for, what,
Speaker 172
49:53
five years of back audit? Do y'all have the funds to pay for
Speaker 52
50:07
it? Yes, we do. That's a good question. I'm pretty much assist with the budget, and I think we had $50,000 allocated for audit. Will that cover these past years?
I do not know. The budgets are pretty tight, as is. We're already over budget in some categories, so we're going to have to do some adjusting there. But it'll be an issue. I mean, it'll be a problem
Representative Lane Jean
Unverified
50:40
all have any reserve money? Not much. Well, when you say not much. We did. Yeah. When you say not
Speaker 179
50:49
much, how much are we talking about? I think we have about $100,000 on reserve now.
Representative Lane Jean
Unverified
50:57
Well, it's going to take some money to fix this. It's going to take everybody working together. And so, you know, I think the best thing to do is five of you get together on the city council and vote from now current to get the state audited. I was a mayor for 16 years at Magnolia, and we always used the state. We never did hire a private firm to spend more money for an audit.
I never thought that was a good, wise use of taxpayer dollars. But it's going to take you some money to get these back audits, and you're going to have to get a reputable firm. You can't be the buddy-buddy. You all are in deep trouble, and you need help, and you need it now. But I would encourage you to just step up and do what
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
51:52
it takes. Thank you. Okay, thank you, Representative Lane. Representative Gasway, go ahead, sir.
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
51:59
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. So I have several questions, and I'll direct some of these to the council members and some
will be to the mayor. But when I heard the council members speak earlier, you mentioned past due accounts and that there was, I think I heard, receivables of over $100,000 that were owed to the city. uh can some one of the council members give a little bit more information about that what kind of accounts are we talking about uh howard how do you know that it's over a hundred thousand dollars
that's owed to the city just give
Speaker 53
52:38
us some more information about that thank you for
Speaker 52
52:43
the question uh so i have a uh age receivables at 4 29 and 23 uh it's broken out between zero and 30 all the way greater than 120 days. I guess in the end of March, it was $122,710.36, with a zero over 30 being at 56 7 77 and 36 cents and uh on 4 29 23 it was 37 399 0 over 30 and 95 266
Speaker 166
53:17
uh was a total so so let me stop you for just a second so what kind
Speaker 52
53:28
of accounts are we talking about here uh augustus city light and water okay so we have our own power okay so back in if i can find at 21 i just found this when i was leaving my house uh the total in in uh september 30th of 21 was $39,728.37.
That's zero to 30, all the way greater than 120. And then at the end of March of this year, it was $122,710. You're saying $122,000? $122,000, so it's
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
54:08
tripled. Yeah, in past due accounts related to sewer and water.
Is that right? Electricity, sewer, and water. Okay. Now, I think one of the points that probably needs to be
made here is legislative audit doesn't audit sewer and water departments.
But nevertheless, this is something that's concerning. Have you observed anything else about these past due accounts that gives you cause for concern? Just the
Speaker 52
54:32
fact that we're not turning any of the services off, whether it's electricity or water or sewer or gas. Okay. It used to be a policy of the city. After the 16th, 2 o'clock in the afternoon, I think, if you hadn't paid your bill, your services were
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
54:50
terminated. Now, you kept referencing time periods there.
Did that have something to do with when there were elections pending, the number of delinquent accounts increased? You know, I can't speak
Speaker 52
55:02
to that. I do have a balance prior to, here's one right here, 729 of 22, which would be pre-election. The balance was $70,000, so I do not have any number right, you know, in the month of November.
Okay, well, that's something that can be figured out. So I've got, again, $70,488, that's the 1st of August. Okay, well,
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
55:33
we can follow up on that. We can check those dates and kind of see how that looks. But the next thing
that I would ask, are you familiar with there being some type of non-profit that's set up within the city that exists to help people who can't pay their utility bills? Are you aware of this? I see Mr. Eldridge shaking his head. Mr. Eldridge, can you speak to that? I
Speaker 103
55:56
think that is called the, what do they call that?
Crowley's Ridge. The Crowley's Ridge, yes. And from what I understand, they don't pay monthly. It's at best quarterly. And there have been times that they've stepped in and that number, the receivable number, has dropped. I don't know who qualifies for
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
56:18
that. Okay. So let me stop you real quick. You're talking about like Crowley's Ridge Rural Development? Yes, sir. Or one of those organizations. But I'm talking about a nonprofit that was started by someone who works within the city.
Are you aware of that? No, sir. I'm not. Okay. Seems like someone mentioned that to me, but maybe that was another case, or maybe they just didn't know what they were talking about. I have more questions, Mr. Chair, but I'll take a break and kind of get back in the queue if other members have questions. If they don't, then I'll
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
56:55
keep going. Any other questions? Okay. Okay. Senator Mark, go right ahead, sir.
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
57:04
I'm trying to decide where to begin, or maybe I should say
who to begin with. While we know that legislative audit does not audit utilities, utilities, it appears to me there's an intermingling with the cash flow within the city that if you had the utilities perfectly balanced and everybody paid their water and electric bill on time, it might not create as much of a problem on the rest of city government.
Mayor, you're nodding. Mr. Youngman's nodding. Again, we're not going
to change the rules just in this case, but the fact of the matter is, and certainly
Chairman Gassaway was touching on this, if you're getting close to elections, somebody's going to have their water turned off, it helps politically to make sure everybody's got their water on, but it doesn't help get the bills paid. And when I see this level of receivables, you know, I know that some of these are vendors that are, let's just say they have leverage over you
that they can deny you certain goods and services that are more or less mandatory to operate the city. And, Mr. Galloway, you were looking at, you were reading some of these receivables, and you obviously saw who the money is owed to. Are there any that jump out at you as that if they cut us off, we're
in trouble type receivables? Is there a pattern to whom it hasn't been paid?
Speaker 52
58:47
So I don't want to speak out of turn or speak too harshly, But it does seem that city employees, there are several city employees that aren't paying their utilities. And when I say it's greater than 120 days, they're relatives of the mayor who's greater than 120 days. And I just don't think that's right.
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
59:18
So the, gosh, I don't know where to begin on that. The receivables are, in this case, like a utility bill that not only, I won't even touch the fact that the mayor may be a relative, but they are city employees. I mean, theoretically, the city could garnish their wages for a portion of what they owe, in effect, to the city. So I'm just, this is a rat's
nest, and it's very concerning to me when you tell me that.
Speaker 52
59:54
Yeah, I mean, I've got page after page of this, if you're
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
59:59
welcome to it. Well, I don't want it right now. I'll tell you who I do want to see. I want to
Speaker 203
1:00:09
know, Mr. Jones, are you familiar with this EGP? I've seen some audit
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
1:00:13
reports from them, but that's. So they have done it for other cities. They're not like a new made-up company. They're a real company accounting firm. As best as we know, and I'm not disparaging.
Yes, I'm not. Okay, great. Thank you, ma'am. And I'm for letting them sort that out. I mean, then they come to us with a report, and then we deal with it. We're not auditors. The auditors kind of work for us, but we're not auditors. So, Mr. Chairman, I'm not so sure. We've got a lot of issues here, and I go back to Chairman Gassway. I don't know which end is up and which one we start with, but it's pretty clear that without something looked at and reported to us
by this firm that's been hired, I don't know where we could make heads or tails of this, and I certainly count on my smart.
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
1:01:12
this room, I see former mayors, I see former county judges, I see smart people and city council members like our Senate chair, Senator Wallace, and they understand what has to be done. And I'm reaching out to y'all to come up with how we get a handle on this.
And other than maybe 30 days' worth of patience and the council and the mayor doing their thing to cooperate and maybe light a fire under these folks. I don't have any idea. Okay. Senator Gilmore. Senator Gilmore, go right ahead, sir. Thank you,
Senator Ben Gilmore
Unverified
1:01:55
Mr. Chair. You know, what I'm hearing is very concerning, and we're sort of all saying the same thing. So it begs the question of they're six years behind.
I think that's what I heard. We've clearly got major issues or things that have been at least alleged, right? So there's allegations of things taking place that are certainly not appropriate. I mean, at what point does, and I mean, I hate to even go down this path, but at what point do we even start to say, is the town able to function? Obviously, they have a charter. Obviously, there's a process in which to take that and the county operate. I mean, I think it would be incumbent on us to hear from the council members that are here to say, I mean, can y'all take these steps that are necessary?
Are there funds there to get an audit to bring yourself current or not? I mean, is there a willingness to take on and do these hard tasks, or is it better for the citizens that basically they go under county control and Augusta lose its charter? I know that's a difficult question, and I'm sorry to be the one to broach it, but I think it's pertinent to the discussion.
Speaker 103
1:03:20
To answer your question, I do think that we have the avenues to get that done. I really do. Now, which step goes forward first? I don't know. We'll see. Chairman Jim,
Speaker 210
1:03:36
go right ahead, sir. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. So
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
1:03:44
I do have a few more questions, because I think ultimately, to Senator Gilmore's point, I mean, this may be where we're heading, depending on what we see.
I think the Attorney General has the ability to bring an action, maybe to revoke a charter, if I remember correctly. You know, I would hate to see it come to that, and probably most people on this committee would, but there are some very serious issues that exist that this is a pretty exceptional case, which may warrant some exceptional circumstances like the revocation of a charter. So I
wouldn't take that off the table. But I do have some questions. One of the other things that I heard was about bank statements.
Councilman Eldridge, has the council asked the mayor to see bank statements
Speaker 116
1:04:36
for the city? I do not know what meeting that was. I have been on
Speaker 103
1:04:41
the council since elected 19, so two and a half years. I have not seen, I have seen financial reports, but I have not seen actual bank statements. No, sir. Have you or anyone
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
1:04:53
else, to your knowledge, asked for bank statements?
To my knowledge, yes. And were you provided the bank statements? No, sir. Mr. Mayor, you're here. Is it true that you've been asked to provide bank statements to members of the council? I haven't been asked personally, but if
Speaker 60
1:05:14
they asked my clerk, I'm sure she would give them to them. I mean, that's not a problem.
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
1:05:21
Okay. Hang on just a second. So you're saying here today that you have never been asked by any member of the council for bank statements?
Speaker 211
1:05:32
of the meetings, but nobody said that they
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
1:05:38
haven't received them. Okay. Have you ever, and you've never provided any to anyone on the council? Well, I haven't personally, no, sir. Okay. All right. There was also some mention about bank accounts being overdrawn. Members of the council, do you, can any of you speak to that, the accounts being overdrawn?
Speaker 52
1:06:07
You know, as far as providing very detailed information right now, the one I've got right here in front of me, it looks like we're overdrawn about 15 out of 30 days in our general fund. I have seen it where we're overdrawn the majority of the month. Say that again. I have seen them, and I don't have them with me, I don't think, where we've been overdrawn the majority of the month. Yes, sir. And what accounts are these?
Well, we've got general fund, we've got, of course, utilities, we've got
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
1:06:55
a street fund. Did I say utilities? And you got this information from the financial reports, I take it? I've got a financial report. Because you've not
Speaker 85
1:07:01
seen the bank statements. No, I've not seen a bank statement. I've seen a financial
Speaker 175
1:07:06
report. Have you asked for bank statements? uh throughout the years
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
1:07:08
i'm sure we have yes okay and when you talk about the overdrawn accounts
which accounts in particular were overdrawn
Speaker 52
1:07:18
at is 3-1-23-3-31-23 it's a general fund and we were overdrawn beginning on the 10th of the month
Speaker 166
1:07:27
and we didn't get back to positive until uh 3-24 so you're saying the general fund account was
Speaker 53
1:07:36
overdrawn was according According to this financial report, yes, it was overdrawn from 310 through 323, 324.
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
1:07:53
Okay. But then I just heard the mayor basically... Mayor's the street fund,
Speaker 53
1:07:58
excuse me. Okay. It's overdrawn from the first of the month through the
Speaker 166
1:08:05
24th. Okay. So that's over three weeks. That's,
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
1:08:08
yeah. So the general fund's been overdrawn. The street fund's been overdrawn. Any of the other accounts? The utilities been overdrawn?
Speaker 53
1:08:21
Utility count, it was overdrawn the first three days.
Well, hold on. It's scattered. 3, 6, it was only
Speaker 218
1:08:32
overdone six days out of the month. Which month? March. Okay, and that's
Speaker 166
1:08:41
the last financial report that you have? That's the last one I have, I think. Okay. That's the last one I have with me. All right, that's fine. But I heard the
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
1:08:53
mayor testify earlier, and I'd like to hear a response on this.
When you asked if you could pay for a private audit, you said that you thought you had over a million dollars
or thought you had the money to pay for a – maybe you didn't say a million dollars, but thought that you had the money to
– cash money to help pay for a private audit. I mean, how do you explain that when all of your accounts seem to have been consistently overdrawn? Bank statements won't
Speaker 39
1:09:17
reflect that. He's showing how the checks come in, how the checks go out. All the checks don't come back to the bank on the day that they're put down on the paper right there.
Speaker 222
1:09:27
And trust me, when we get a thing from the bank, they call us and tell us, okay, your general went over. We had to come and we transfer money. Representative
Speaker 52
1:09:52
Ethan. Let Mr. Hunter. So we had this American Rescue Fund. I think it was over $500,000.
I'm not sure, but we also had a small tornado on the north end of Augusta, and I guess that was December of 21. And I hate to get into this right now, but there was a bill run up against the city for cleanup. After the homeowners insurance paid everything they had, The city stepped in and cleaned up, I think 35 homes were affected, cleaned up yards, and anyway, that bill was over $500,000.
The council was never asked to spend $500,000-plus to assist and clean up on the north end of Augusta. So obviously we had a lot of creditors. Some even coming to our meetings wanted to know when they could get paid. And then I think the restrictions on the American Rescue Funds were loosened to where we were able to use those funds to take care of some of those creditors where we helped clean up after the tornado damage.
The problem there is the city council has never consulted on that. It was just
Speaker 90
1:11:12
done. It was a huge number. The city council also
Speaker 222
1:11:22
agreed every month to pay each bill. They voted. It's in the minutes. They agreed to pay the bill each month, each vendor. And the cleanup total wasn't $500,000. The total that we turned in the FEMA was $500,000. That counts all of the employees and your trucks and everything that you used.
Speaker 40
1:11:40
The total was $500,000. The vendors weren't near that much.
Speaker 222
1:11:45
And the rescue money, it was put back in to replace the police salaries that we used. We followed all the guidelines on rescue and got, I mean, municipally guidelines. So I guess
Speaker 52
1:11:59
my point is, and I don't know if we need to get into this, we've got right at $2,000. They've got a new sign-up. It's $1,999, I think, at the edge of town. So we've got $1,999 citizens. and we had, again, I think about a half million dollars of American rescue money
that in my mind should have been spread between each and every citizen of Augusta. Instead, it was spent on cleanup that was not approved that only benefited. I mean, it benefited the city, the appearance of the city, But the direct benefit was only for the path of the tornado, which I think was 35 homes. So it took half a million dollars, it was for everyone, and basically paid debt on 35, the area that had the 35 homes in it.
Speaker 13
1:13:04
Chairman Jim, are you finished with your question? I'm finished for now. I may have some more.
Speaker 226
1:13:11
Right now, we need to let Senator Wallace speak. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Mayor, I've heard it said, but do
Speaker 228
1:13:25
you have city employees that have not paid their utility bills? There are some that are behind, yes, sir. Do you know how many?
Speaker 39
1:13:35
Three right now, maybe. One, two, three at the most. Out of how many? 30 employees. And how long have they been behind? One of them has been behind several months. Several months. Yes, sir. Mr. Mayor, do you
Speaker 231
1:13:47
have any relatives that are behind on their utility bills? I have one daughter that's on there. On that list of however many is on there. And she don't work for the city. And how many
Speaker 229
1:14:01
months has she been behind? Several. He fell on hard times, yes.
Speaker 228
1:14:06
And I have a question. If I may continue, Mr. Chair. I'll continue.
Speaker 228
1:14:24
Leachville for about 12 years, and we're about the size of y'all. We're 2,000 people now. In our system, the mayor had a certain amount of money that if he went over that, the city council had to approve it.
It was actually $5,000. Do you all have that type of system at all? So you, so, I'm sorry, go ahead. I don't think we
Speaker 233
1:14:51
do, but we could benefit from that. So
Speaker 228
1:14:54
that $500,000 that was spent was spent under your approval, and then it came back at the end of the month for the city council, and I'd like to have a city council member answer that. I think the protocol
Speaker 116
1:15:11
on that is we do not have a spending limit for the mayor,
but we do have a bid limit. Anything over $10,000 has got to be bid
Speaker 228
1:15:20
out. Were the projects bid out? Not to my knowledge. Mr. Mayor, is there a reason why those projects were not built out,
Speaker 39
1:15:30
together at the tornado site and what we talked about, they said, let's get it cleaned
Speaker 40
1:15:35
up. So that's what I done. I mean, I'm not making excuses. I mean, this has been discussed before. My home was one of the homes that was hitting the tornado.
And within 20-something hours after the tornado had hit, we're standing out there talking to FEMA and everybody else. and we have 300-and-something pine trees that are down in a six-block neighborhood. And I'm still a little shook up. And when FEMA says, you've got a mess to clean up, and I've talked to some council members that say, hey, I've got this buddy here that he's in the tree cleaning service. I'm going to hire him. Get him in there. So, I mean, you're under the assumption that, hey, we've got to clean this up.
You've got council members that are out there not objecting. And so, yeah, I mean, I might have should have just called a meeting. But, I mean, when you're in that position at that point, no,
Speaker 228
1:16:31
I didn't. Well, the last thing I'm going to say, and I don't intend for it to be a statement. It's going to be a question. Mr. Mayor and members, in less than 14 months, you all are not going to be receiving any
turn-back money. I mean, unless something happens, unless we get good audits by somebody. I do agree that you all need to pay for these audits to get caught up, and then afterwards this committee can talk with our Attorney General.
We may need to come down and investigate this a lot further, but I ended up just asking do you realize that in 14 months you all are going to not receive any more turnback money? Okay. Thank you. Thank
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:17:50
you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Oh, yeah. Senator Stone, you have the speaking.
Speaker 243
1:17:55
let's see there it goes uh mayor i want
Senator Matt Stone
Unverified
1:18:05
to come back to the bank statements that the city council members asked about yes sir you said a while ago that you maybe weren't asked specifically um i also heard you say that you had all the information necessary to withstand an audit but i think for the record i think i've heard the city council members asked you for the bank statements today so for the record when can you fulfill their request and
provide them with the ask bank statements if they want banks i mean i
Speaker 144
1:18:32
can have them tomorrow if they want them or yeah tomorrow uh would that be soon enough for y'all to get
Senator Matt Stone
Unverified
1:18:39
the bank statements all right that worked for me all right mayor for the record they need to have the requested bank statements and how long how many months back do you need 2021-22
Speaker 124
1:18:53
is what they asked for all right well
Speaker 88
1:18:55
then get them to them tomorrow please thank you
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:19:03
all right the next person that's asked to speak is uh general barry go right ahead sir thank
Speaker 245
1:19:13
you mr chairman uh for taking my question since i'm not a member of the committee but I tell you, this has got to be the best case of the most mismanaged municipal organization I've ever seen in my entire life. And I think that probably the high school student council could probably do a better job of managing that city.
It's a shame. It's embarrassing. If I was the mayor, I'd really be embarrassed. This is not good stuff. But I do have a couple questions because I'd really like to know how many of the mayor's relatives have delinquent water bills? And if
Speaker 248
1:19:55
they've had conversations with you, like your daughter, say, hey, Daddy, I can't pay my water bill. Has your daughter came to you and had a conversation like that?
Speaker 222
1:20:07
No, she had to go to the clerks like everybody else and ask for
Speaker 249
1:20:12
an extension. And you have no knowledge, had no knowledge? I knew she
Speaker 133
1:20:15
was behind. Okay. I mean, we've almost got her caught up now. How about other citizens of that city? Oh, there's several that come and ask for extensions or fall
Speaker 250
1:20:26
on hard times or want something. Okay.
Speaker 93
1:20:31
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Tim, have we got
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:20:36
anyone? Representative Lanny Fyde, go right ahead, sir.
Speaker 106
1:20:38
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mayor, did I understand right that you have two audits under contract right now? Yes, sir. They are. Are they
Speaker 40
1:20:53
written contracts or verbal contracts? Under for the audits? Yes. No, they're written. We signed
Speaker 133
1:21:00
it in September of 21. Okay. In my understanding, they're
Speaker 40
1:21:04
going to do two a year? Yes, sir. Well, they're waiting to check compliances on 2017. That will be finished. They're working on 2018, and hopefully 2018 and 2019 by January.
And then maybe we can – I mean, I've got now
Speaker 150
1:21:18
– I mean, it's – Well, if they're doing two a year, you're six
Speaker 106
1:21:22
years away from clearing up this whole issue if they're only going to do two a year, and that's
Speaker 44
1:21:28
what I understood you just said. In 2024, I have to be within 21 audit? Is that
Speaker 252
1:21:34
correct? you'd need through 2022. Okay. All right. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you, Representative Lanny.
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:21:47
What about it, Mr. Jones? Where are we at with our program? Well,
Speaker 16
1:21:56
I think it would be up to the committee to take whatever action they would like to take, and then we could move to
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
1:22:11
the next item on the agenda. thank you mr. chairman um gentlemen first of all we got a lot more work to do as you know the full committee meets tomorrow and i am for one going to support a move to invite you to come
back next month and in the meantime have uh our staff and that's mr norman and all the folks that work for him to provide y'all with a list of questions that you need to be prepared and some of them will require you to bring paperwork but we want some real answers when you come back next month so I will with the concurrence of other members of the full committee we will probably make that official tomorrow morning and I would say please be prepared because I'm not saying you weren't prepared today you didn't necessarily know what we're going to ask but we're going to have to
drill down on this, and I would get in touch with your EGP folks and let them know that this is not time to take a summer vacation, so we
would improve that, and I believe, Mr. Chairman, that Senator Kroll has a question.
Speaker 79
1:23:19
Thank you. That's exactly right. Go ahead. Go ahead.
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:23:28
And you know, y'all, what I worry about is the seriousness of the turnback. If this is not completed by the midpoint of next year, Mr. Jones, what
would that be, a couple hundred thousand dollars? I would have
Speaker 17
1:23:54
to. In 2016, I'm being told their turn back was $180,000, so it will be north of that, I
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:24:01
would think. Representative Land, go ahead, sir. I'd like to make a motion at
Speaker 147
1:24:22
proper time. This is the proper time. You go right ahead, sir. Okay. Okay, it keeps kicking off. I apologize. I make a motion we send it back to the Executive Committee with the testimony we've heard today.
I do not see how that we can solve this problem. It appears it'll take six years in the avenue they're taking right now. And so I make that motion.
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:24:42
Okay, you all have heard the motion Representative Lanney made about taking this back to Executive Committee, which is
a great motion it's where it needs to be can i get a second on that
lane jean seconds okay all those in favor say aye all those against uh opposed say no okay thank you
Yes, and we want to thank you all, but we do know the seriousness of the situation, and we will be letting you know something, because this needs to be fixed. Augusta is
Speaker 267
1:25:27
a fine town, y'all, and this doesn't need to happen. We need to get these things straightened out, okay? Thank y'all.
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:25:35
All right, the next one is discussion about Act 709 of
2021, repayment of highway turnback funds, the town of Fulton. Is
Speaker 270
1:25:57
Fulton here? No, we're going to talk about the repayment first. We'll just
Speaker 240
1:26:03
talk about this in general. Okay, Mr. Jones is going to fill
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:26:09
us in about the city of Fulton.
Speaker 274
1:26:16
Okay, in the last meeting, this committee did consider
Speaker 18
1:26:20
requests from the town of Fulton and the town of Haynes, And what the committee voted to do was have staff make
Speaker 16
1:26:30
some recommendations on what the process would be trying to bring some standardization to it.
Speaker 17
1:26:41
on a document that we emailed to you, and I think it's in your packet as well.
And this is regarding cities that owe their street fund. they've used the street fund monies for other things for general
Speaker 18
1:26:56
city expenditures maybe even for water expenditures that kind of thing and when they owe money they either had to pay that money back by the end of 2022 or they had to pass an ordinance that they were paying 10 percent of their general revenues back each year until it's paid or if they couldn't do that they were supposed to
Speaker 16
1:27:19
come before this committee and request for permission to pay less than 10%.
And so this document is a suggestion on what to do if they're requesting to repay less than 10%. And, you know, there's some information there, but the bottom line on the back page, we suggested a list of seven questions, or you could change those questions if you want, But our vision was that a city would answer these questions in writing and send them to us, and we could provide them for you when they have a request for repaying less than 10%,
and you could approve those, or if you didn't understand or like their answers, you could invite them back to give testimony, that kind of thing. So that's generally what our suggestion is. Senator Mark. Go
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:28:18
right ahead sir. Thank you. Thank
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
1:28:24
you Mr. Chairman. Mr. Jones thank you for this and as you recall we voted
last month to ask the staff to come up with this to come
up with a process maybe some municipality or city or county would qualify for a little more leniency on the repayment of monies that were not put in the street fund, but we needed to have some kind of documentation before we, this committee, could make a decision of recommending that they be granted some leniency. These seven questions, I want to commend the staff for doing
a wonderful job of coming up with it. Obviously, if you're in trouble with the IRS, you're going to have real problems keeping up with dealing with us so has everyone had a chance to either receive it by email or to review what is in the packet on page four and if so Mr. Chairman if everybody is okay and there's no additions or deletions I would move that we adopt this questionnaire as something that we would at least use as a guideline it's not a hard and fast rule
but it's something we'd have to have from any municipality that wants to ask for something less than having to repay the 10% of their revenue until they're
caught back up on the repayment to the street fund. Can
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:29:57
I make that in a motion? Yes, sir. The motion has been made by Senator Johnson to second by Representative Carol Dalby to accept these seven guidelines for any kind of adjustment that would be made for any of the towns or cities or counties or any that actually want to pay that.
And it looks great to me. I
mean, have y'all had a chance to look at it? Okay. Okay. Well,
the motion has been made by Senator Johnson to accept those seven inquiry questions. Will
someone make a second? That was Carol. Okay. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Okay. Thank you. Thank you.
Speaker 163
1:30:54
You could ask them to fill out this questionnaire
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:31:01
if you'd like. Begin with them. Yeah, and it's a great idea. And Senator Mark, will you
please explain to the people that are here and
Speaker 165
1:31:10
the people on the committee why the reason would be
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
1:31:17
for anything other than the 10%? Right. Mr. Chairman, by putting these items in a list, we're setting some priorities. It still gives flexibility to this subcommittee and to the full committee,
but it allows them to demonstrate that they have some extenuating circumstances like owing money to the IRS or whatever that would need to come first and that we would have that information prior to granting any leniency toward repayment of the street fund and for the members of the public that are not here. This is a case where cities receive general turn-back funds and they receive street funds, which are highway taxes. If they don't, if some cases they have put the money that's supposed to go to streets
into their general fund, they used it for other purposes, they're required under the law to pay that back. And we usually set them up on a repayment schedule and we set the 10% as a minimum to pay back. If they don't, or say they can't do the 10%, we want to have some documentation of why they can't meet that 10% requirement. So that's the purpose of this questionnaire is to know whether their true need is there and they're really in that kind of hardship or if they're just trying to pay back as little as possible.
So this is a beginning. It's a journey, not a destination, I should say. But that's at least the logic behind it. But the final decision rests with this subcommittee and the full committee. Thank
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:32:51
you, Mr. Chair. Yes, sir. Thank you. Thank you, Chairman Mark. Our next item is review of reports.
Speaker 12
1:33:02
All right. Thank you, Mr. Chair. We will begin with the entities who have
Speaker 16
1:33:08
guests here to answer a question.
and we'll begin on page one with the city of madison and we'll review some of the findings and then we'll call the officials to the end of the table the city of madison for the year 2021 this is a previously deferred report it was deferred
Speaker 18
1:33:29
last month although our report shows a balance of 45 000 in the general fund at the end of 2021 it was brought to our attention that the general fund owed a significant amount for balances to the street fund and sanitation funds. When these
outstanding amounts were considered, the general fund had a deficit balance of $196,000. A similar finding was noted in the two previous reports. State aid for highway funds in previous years of $25,000 owed to the street fund was not transferred during the engagement period as required by Arkansas Code. The city is making payments of $100 per month toward this balance. A similar finding was noted in the previous 10 reports dating back to 2009. Sales taxes restricted for sanitation expenditures of $8,000 were not transferred to the sanitation fund as well as
previous year's amounts owed of $208,000 leaving a total balance of $216,000. The city is making payments of $100 per month toward this balance. A similar finding was noted in the previous five reports dating back to 2014. Continuing on page two, fixed asset listing was provided but did not include proper control totals and identification numbers when applicable. Also, the listing contained items below the minimum amount prescribed by the city's fixed asset policy and non-compliance with code as noted in the previous two reports. The city's
accounts were under collateralized by $324,000 at December 31st, 2021 in non-compliance with code. Recorder Treasurer N.E. Hardrick is here to answer questions.
Speaker 256
1:35:27
the recorder treacherous lady people type
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:35:29
oh yes ma'am and you're from could you please give us your name and and what you do and what
Speaker 290
1:36:27
Okay, sorry about that. I'm Annie Hardrick, the recorded trader
Speaker 286
1:36:31
for the City of Madison. And I'm here, and I have with me Ms. Ernestine Broadway, who was the former bookkeeper that did day-to-day operation, and she can explain to you more about the situation than I. So that's why we're here together. Yes, ma'am. Can you identify yourself,
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:36:54
please, and go right to where you need to be?
Ernestine Broadway
Unverified
1:37:04
My name is Ernestine Broadway. I assist the recorded treasurer in her duties. What
Speaker 294
1:37:11
we had done the last few years per our auditor was to pay $100 a month to the street department and $100 per month to the sanitation. account, and that's what we've been doing. Ma'am, could
Speaker 196
1:37:29
I ask you a question? Each one of those,
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:37:34
basically, how much is owed back
for those, was it $324,000, some odd cents?
I believe so. excuse me we have two more actually is 8507 and 208 thousand and four dollars about
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:38:17
me ask you this mr jones knowing the situation that we're
in with this they're asking for something other than what they owe or what do we need to go over there
Speaker 274
1:38:30
they haven't made a request to pay less than 10 percent they're just here to answer questions about these
Speaker 42
1:38:40
these findings committee you're wide open you can ask any question at
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
1:38:48
any Chug. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Ladies, thank you for coming and for being willing to answer
our questions. I did a little quick math, just looking at the finding on the sanitation fund. If you pay $100 a month toward the $216,511 balance, not counting any interest or anything like that, or addition to that figure, it'll take 180 years to pay that back.
Speaker 303
1:39:11
Does that not feel a little daunting to y'all? Well,
Speaker 294
1:39:18
I can only say what we were told to do, and we've been doing that.
We were told to pay $100 per month to each account, and we have been paying that $100 per month for each account. Now, this is something that has been going on years before, so, like I say, I can only say we're doing what we were told to do. We have not missed a payment since we were set up to make these payments. Mr. Chairman, I think
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:39:49
Representative Dalby has a question. Representative Dalby, go right ahead, ma'am.
Representative Carol Dalby
Unverified
1:40:00
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Who told you to do
Speaker 304
1:40:05
that? It's been so long ago, I can't remember, but I'm
Speaker 294
1:40:08
thinking we agreed with the auditors to do it. They asked us how much will we pay, and we told them that we could pay that amount of money, and that's what we've been paying since we were told
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:40:25
to pay it. Well, you know, it's a lot of money. Is there any way that you all can do more than that for each one of those two?
Speaker 294
1:40:33
I'm no longer with the city of Madison. We have a new mayor that took over the first of the year, so you can talk to him about
Speaker 304
1:40:50
it. He's here today. What is the will of the committee?
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:41:03
Where is the mayor? Sir, you're invited
Speaker 311
1:41:13
to the table. You might as well swear him in,
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:41:30
Mr. Chairman. Mayor, could you identify yourself, sir?
Speaker 313
1:41:34
Yes, I'm Roy Winfrey, the new mayor, elected and took office in January of this year. Sir, is there anything that you could bring to
Speaker 42
1:41:47
this situation that maybe we could work that out? It looks like there's just maybe a couple things you
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:41:53
could do, maybe pay possibly a little bit more, because if we don't do more than what we're doing, sir, it looks like it's going to take a couple hundred years pay this
Speaker 316
1:42:08
off I do understand that and I have to be honest
Speaker 317
1:42:11
with you I haven't been in office long
enough to figure out which end is up and right now I'm having other difficulties that's costing us to have to spend money that we normally wouldn't have wouldn't have to and so I haven't really sat down to see how we can figure this all out and see if we can't even pay more. Tim, is there any way we could get back with
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:42:39
these folks and let them know what we can do? Or do we
need to make a move on it here today? Okay. Need to
make a move? Well, what would you suggest? Mr. Jones and what they could do, you know, a
Speaker 241
1:42:57
couple hundred dollars. motion. If Mr. Jones can
Speaker 17
1:43:03
cry, motion. Yeah, this situation is set up to hear their responses to what they had to say about it. And generally, the committee files the report after hearing their responses. Okay.
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:43:25
file this report. All those in favor say aye.
Speaker 18
1:43:31
All those folks say no. Okay, go right ahead, Tim. All right. Thank you.
Speaker 16
1:43:40
I appreciate being here. Thank you, folks. Okay, the next report will be
Speaker 18
1:43:44
Searcy County beginning on page 3. Arkansas Code requires county management to maintain accurate financial records.
The financial records contain omissions and errors that are considered material as specified as follows. The general fund financial records contain misstatements primarily due to posting errors and misclassifications of revenues and expenditures. Other funds in the aggregate financial records contain misstatements for several financial statement line items primarily due to posting and misclassification of revenues and expenditures.
The county judge was reimbursed twice for $2,468 purchase made on a personal credit card. As of the report date, the judge did not reimburse the county. A similar finding was noted in the previous report. On page 4, the portion of the county judge's salary paid from the county road fund exceeded 50% in noncompliance with code. A similar finding was noted in the prior report. And on page 5, we noted the following deficiencies during testing of payroll transactions.
Payroll reported to the Internal Revenue Service on quarterly 941 reports did not agree with wages reported on W-2 forms. We were also unable to reconcile payroll files to the Appropriations Journal and to wages reported to the IRS. IRS quarterly 941 reports, Arkansas State Income Tax reports, and Arkansas Public Employees Retirement System reports were not filed in a timely manner. A similar finding was noted in the previous report. County Circuit Clerk Debbie Loggins is here to answer questions.
Speaker 245
1:45:28
Representative Perry, do you have something you need to say, sir? Yes, thank you, Mr. Chairman. So I wanted to, at the start of this, if you recall, and I've
Speaker 248
1:45:46
been very interested in this, I'm wondering where the prosecutor coordinator's office is with the report that we had referred to them last year. As the committee might remember, the county judge up there, we had filed,
or the prosecutor coordinator's office filed an emergency petition for removal from office for that judge. And there were some serious questions about credit card use, using his own personal credit card and the county reimbursing him and a lot of the items that were not, you know, on their inventory listing they couldn't account for. And has the prosecuting coordinator's office, have they given us any information whatsoever as to what they have found, if anything, in Searcy County?
Speaker 274
1:46:39
I would have to check on that, but the judge was removed from office. No, no, he was not?
Speaker 248
1:46:47
Okay. Well, he resigned from office. Okay, that's right. But it's a long story. But I have concerns about it because even though he resigned from office, he still needs to be held accountable for his actions when he was an elected official in Searcy County. And there's some very serious questions that need to be answered by the Prosecutor Coordinator's Office, who the prosecutor in Searcy County recused herself of that situation because of the politics issue.
But the prosecutor coordinator's office picked it up, and we need to follow up to make sure that that investigation or whatever is being conducted so he's held accountable. I will check on that. I
Speaker 18
1:47:28
know every year we give a report on all the reports that are referred to the prosecutor, but I'll check on
Speaker 226
1:47:37
that before the August meeting. Okay. Thank you, Mr.
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:47:41
Jones. need a motion to accept to file a report
so moved need a second all those in favor say aye aye all opposed
Speaker 324
1:47:53
no ma'am we want to thank you for coming today
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:48:05
appreciate you being here You drove a little piece to
be here, and, you know, we appreciate folks showing up and doing the things that we know that is right. Thank you, ma'am.
Debbie Loggins
Unverified
1:48:17
Thank you, sir. My name is Debbie Loggins. I'm
Speaker 326
1:48:20
the Searcy County County and Circuit Clerk, and I've lost track of everything that you read, but as far as the payroll records, the 941s, 2021 was a bad year, and we've since straightened it out, of course, and all of the irregularities at the end of the year were straightened up with a 941X, of course, and we always balance our 941s with our W-2s now at the end of the year, so we've learned our lesson on that. This is my 13th year in office, and the only time I've had to come down here to address an issue like this.
So going forward, of course, we won't let it happen again. Any other questions? Something I did notice, you mentioned the county judge was reimbursed twice. He has since come in and paid one of those back, so that has been taken care of. The posting issues and errors like that, if I had more detail, I could tell you about expenditures, but I don't know about revenue. But, you
Debbie Loggins
Unverified
1:49:22
know, we're working on straightening out all of our issues, and I think 2022 looks good.
Speaker 24
1:49:28
Is there any questions that you all would like to
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:49:37
We've accepted. Okay, we've already voted on a motion,
Speaker 18
1:49:48
too. Okay, thank you. Thank you for coming. Okay, the next report with guests here, the Town of Allport for the year 2022. It's on page 7. Although our report shows a balance of $54,000 in the general fund,
The town owed significant amounts to the street fund, the HACT Regional Waste Treatment District, and for the completion of the Fun Park project. When these outstanding amounts were considered, the general fund had a deficit of $15,000. A similar finding was noted in the previous four reports. Mayor Jeremy Allen and Recorder Treasurer Kenneth Rayner are here to answer questions. Okay, gentlemen.
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:50:31
Can you identify yourself and let us know where you're from and what we're here to
Speaker 329
1:50:44
do? Kenneth Rayner, Mayor of Allport. Jeremy Allen, Recorder Treasurer,
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:50:46
Town of Allport. Thank you. Thank you guys for being here today. Could you all kind of explain the situation to us and let us know
Speaker 330
1:50:57
kind of what's going on? uh regarding the amounts uh one i want to point out and uh first of all excuse me thanks for
having us here uh secondly uh regarding their grant uh the amount was owed because the work had not been done yet so that's why the grant funds were uh still listed as money owed uh the We're just finished within the last four to six weeks. Looking back on it, we thought it was going to be finished much sooner based on what we've been told about the group that assists us with the grant. But looking back on it and going forward, we will always ensure that the funds for the grant will always have a new bank account created just for that.
But that's why the grant funds are there. In regards to the street fund that goes back to the period from 2006 to 2010, we continue to pay on that. We have an amount of about $2,700 per year right now since me and the mayor came in the office in 2019. That's down to approximately $10,000 right now. Regional wastewater district, that's down to approximately $3,000. And what we plan to do is have the regional wastewater amount, once that's paid off,
take that amount and apply it to the street fund to get it paid off much sooner. We could possibly have everything paid off by no later than the end of the first quarter of 2025, the latest based on current trends, but, you know, things do come
Speaker 331
1:52:26
up. We have incidents that come up where we may sometimes pay more to the
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:52:35
street fund payback than what we normally do. Gentlemen, let me ask you this. This $22,236, how do
y'all think that you'll go about getting through this thing?
It looks like you're spending more money than actually you're taking in
Speaker 290
1:52:59
for the general fund. They just overspent the budget. They had the money. They just didn't exceed it. Are they
Speaker 21
1:53:06
okay with it? Yeah, they just didn't run their budget. Okay. okay um let me ask you
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:53:12
this gentlemen the 54,534 in the general fund were y'all just paying back the street for money that y'all borrowed from the street fund yes there are approximately
Speaker 333
1:53:22
27 dollars has been paid off per year and that continues to be the
Speaker 330
1:53:27
trend. But the other money, like the $54,000, some of that is the grant money for the Farm Park grant, which was just completed and paid out. Let me ask you
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:53:40
this, sir. The money that we're speaking about here, is that $54,000? Has that been repaid to the street fund?
Speaker 336
1:53:57
Fifty-four, five, three, four. Make sure your mic's off so we can turn the
Speaker 339
1:54:10
mayor. The $54,000 is not owed the street fund. The $54,000 was grant money that received for the street fund.
Speaker 340
1:54:17
I see, sir, and that sounds fine. But
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:54:20
the $22,236, can you explain that just a little bit? It would
just spend more money than we took in or what happened there more than appropriated
Speaker 330
1:54:30
Yeah, what happened calculations of the general this the grandpa money was in the general fund That was trying to speak to earlier that that money should have been separated So it would it does show that we spend more than what we had come in because That grandpa money had been appropriate from the previous year But then once the invoices started coming in for the work, we spent it out So regular funds that come in we didn't spend more
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:55:00
It looks it looks like sir that you spent money that actually was appropriated I mean the money came into the county But this is kind of like something that drug over into the the next year. Is that right of what happened? Sir, you're not coming in.
Speaker 330
1:55:35
Can you hit your button on the right side? Got a magic touch. No. The grant was really awarded to the town in July 2021. 21, we didn't receive our first invoice for it from the contract until July 2022. So that grant money has always gone towards the invoices from the grant. So as far as actual money owed via the street fund at the end of 2022, that amount was approximately $11,568. The amount owed
to AJCT was approximately right at $4,200, if I recall correctly. Since that time frame, And we paid to both each month the $200 amount for AJCT, the Regional Sewer Wastewater District. And that amount is now at $3,000. Right now, the amount owed to the street fund
Speaker 96
1:56:50
Sir, one more time, question? Did someone ask
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:56:56
us? Oh, it's you, Senator Moore.
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
1:57:03
Go right ahead, sir. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mayor, the finding says that you spent $22,236 more than what was appropriated. Do you agree and understand that fact, or
do you dispute that fact? No, I
Speaker 346
1:57:22
do not agree because I think that is because the deficit of the money owed to HACT and street fund was not put in the budget originally.
So it's showing that we have that deficit for spending that, but we never spent
Speaker 347
1:57:40
that money. Well, you understand the difference between expenditure and appropriation, don't you? Yes. Appropriation is an authority
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
1:57:45
to spend, but you spent more than it was authorized. A simple vote of the city council could have raised that
appropriation level to cover the funds available if you had it. Do you understand what I'm saying? Yes, I understand what you're saying. Okay. Now, one question, Mayor, and I'm going to try to move through this quickly. We could go into
this rat hole, but I'm not going to do it.
The attorney general has sued to revoke your charter. and the original suit by Attorney General Rutledge was dismissed and the new suit was filed by Attorney General Griffin. Do you all still have Mr. Proctor as your attorney representing the city in that? Is that correct? Yes. How much has Mr. Proctor been paid to fight this lawsuit?
Speaker 346
1:58:38
Original payment of $3,500? $3,500 original payment so far. That's how much he's received so far,
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
1:58:46
$3,500? Yes. Okay, and of course, that probably doesn't matter to him,
but it's a separate lawsuit, a new lawsuit, because it's over the same issue. So he's continuing to represent the city on this matter. Is that correct? Yes. Okay. Is the city ready just to say uncle and admit that the Attorney General has the authority
to file this suit and the General Assembly's actions under the law to revoke your charter are legitimate, or do y'all want to continue to play this budget game for the next couple of years? I would have
Speaker 346
1:59:29
to say yes. You're ready to throw in the towel? No, we're not ready to throw in the towel. Yes, we are continuing.
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
1:59:36
We're going to continue. Okay, well, it bothers me that we're
seeing all these problems. and you're paying Mr. Proctor $3,500 to basically not do what you're supposed to do
and to avoid it by going to court. So I'm very troubled by that. And once again, I feel like there's very little solution here. So if it would be in order at this time, Mr. Chairman, I would move that we file this report. Motion has been made. All those in favor say aye. Okay. How
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
2:00:05
about a second? Okay. There you go. Thank y'all. Oh,
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
2:00:22
Aye. Okay. All those posts, I know. Go
Speaker 203
2:00:37
ahead. Thank you, gentlemen. Okay. The next report is the town of West Point at the bottom of
Speaker 18
2:00:43
page 7. The governing body did not review the prior report at the next meeting after receiving the report, and meeting minutes did not adequately document the review of the recommendations and actions taken
as required by code. A similar finding was issued in the previous report. The 2022 and 2021 budgets were not adopted by ordinance or resolution as required by code. A similar finding was issued in the previous report. Mayor Ronald Faith is here to answer questions. sir could you identify yourself please ronald faith mayor of west point
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
2:01:24
can you maybe lead us into this and let us see where you're actually out at with this type of report.
Speaker 352
2:01:54
There we go. There it is. As far as reporting in the minutes, I had a previous clerk recorded, she was 80 years old, and she was not good at writing down what was discussed. She is no longer with us, so that's why some of that wasn't in the previous minutes. On the not adopting the resolution or the ordinance on the budget, I have no excuse. I flat did not do it when I was cited two years ago.
I looked at it and filed it out of sight, out of mind, and continued doing it the way that when I was on the council with the previous two mayors, and then when I took over, was doing it as such. There is a note taped to my computer now to do so, so it will not happen again. But I have no excuse for not complying.
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
2:02:52
Thank you, sir. All right, Mr. Jones, is all this in your accord? Everything sound all right?
okay sir we appreciate you coming down someone needs to make a motion to file
this motion second okay all those in favor say aye all right thank you sir for coming down okay that's i
Speaker 16
2:03:28
else here that is a guest to answer questions i
think that's all the guests we have so if not let's move to page one and we'll move those through those reports uh taylor waterworks um we had it was a deferred last
Speaker 18
2:03:41
time because we had not received a um an answer or response and that was the only reason in the since the last meeting we have received a response staff would recommend we filed the finding was they had not uh insured or collateralized their deposits and they have done so at this point motion filed okay all those
Speaker 16
2:04:03
in favor all those in favor say aye okay The next was the city of Pangburn, page two. Holly Hopkins was the recorded treasurer, and we
Speaker 18
2:04:14
have discovered since the last meeting she's no longer the recorded treasurer. There were just two findings regarding the receipts and disbursements journals. Staff would recommend filing the report. Motion filed. Second. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Thank you. Page 3, Little River County.
This is beginning the reports referred to the prosecuting attorney. The county judge paid $600 to a quorum court member's business for a one-time delivery service without an authorizing ordinance, an apparent conflict with code, and an attorney general's opinion. This report's going to the prosecutor. No one was invited because it was not a repeat finding. Staff would recommend filing the report. Second.
Speaker 271
2:05:01
Second. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Okay, all those opposed. Thank you.
Speaker 18
2:05:12
we have Union County for the year 2021. On October 18, 2021, a cash receipt for $4,966 in delinquent taxes, penalties, and interest was issued to a taxpayer and subsequently voided by the deputy tax collector. On October 19, 2021, a new cash receipt was issued to this taxpayer for $3,256, a difference of $1,710. During an interview with legislative audit staff on December 5, 2022,
the deputy tax collector indicated the receipt was voided so that interest charges could be removed and refunded to the taxpayer via cashier's check. However, documentation of a cashier's check being issued couldn't be provided. Later the same day, the deputy tax collector deposited $1,710 in cash and maintained the cash that was found in the tax collector's vault. Again, this finding is going to the prosecuting attorney. It's not a repeat finding, so there's no one here to answer questions.
Staff would recommend filing the report.
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
2:06:19
I'll move by. Motion has been filed. Okay.
Speaker 271
2:06:23
Need a second? Okay. All those in favor say aye. Aye.
Speaker 18
2:06:34
Okay. Opposed? All right. Now we are moving to page 8, the City of Thornton for the years 2021, 2020, 2019. Again, this is a report with findings, and we received the findings,
we received the responses after we had the the summary prepared and um so what we staff would recommend filing reports since we have received adequate
Speaker 271
2:07:01
responses okay second okay well all those favor say aye. All those
Speaker 18
2:07:14
on page nine, or actually at the bottom
of page eight, we have 29 reports with responses from page eight through 18. Staff would be happy to answer questions if you have those. If not, staff would recommend filing these reports. All
Speaker 271
2:07:34
those in favor, say aye. Aye. Okay. All those opposed.
Speaker 365
2:07:39
All right. On pages 19 through 21, there's 61 reports with no findings.
Staff would recommend filing reports. Motion to file.
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
2:07:53
In favor, say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Thank you. Mr. Chair, that
Speaker 366
2:07:58
concludes review of the reports. Thank you so much.
Speaker 34
2:08:07
That's for a moment to adjourn, Mr. Chair. I'll
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
2:08:09
tell you what, will you make a motion to adjourn?
Speaker 2
2:08:14
Thank you, Representative Carolyn. What about it, Lanny? You second that one? I second it, yes.
Speaker 215
2:08:19
There you go. Thank you all for coming. Thank you, folks. Yes, sir. Thank you, John. I've got to run. Can I do it for you? You did fine. I did. I've got to run. I'm right, sir. You go ahead and do what you got
Speaker 48
2:08:31
to do, man. Ron's going to introduce me, so I got to get out. You go do what you got to do. Thanks. No, you're welcome.
Agenda
Call to Order by Chair
City of Augusta – Mayor and City Council
Explanation of Lack of Audit Report Submission
Discussion of Act 709 of 2021, Repayment of Highway Turnback Funds
1. Town of Fulton
2. Town of Haynes
Review of Reports (Refer to the Synopsis)
The next meetings of the Legislative Joint Auditing Committee will be held on August 10, 2023
Adjournment
Documents
| Title | Type | Pages | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Agenda — LEGISLATIVE JOINT AUDITING - COUNTIES AND MUNICIPALITIES, Jun 1, 2023 | Agenda | 1 | Official source ↗ |
Speakers
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
Senator Matt Stone
Unverified
Speaker 6
Speaker 15
Speaker 16
Speaker 17
Speaker 18
Senator Ben Gilmore
Unverified
Speaker 31
Speaker 40
Speaker 45
Speaker 51
Speaker 52
Speaker 53
Speaker 57
Speaker 39
Speaker 60
Speaker 68
Speaker 70
Speaker 72
Speaker 90
Speaker 42
Representative Lane Jean
Unverified
Speaker 96
Speaker 97
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
Speaker 103
Speaker 106
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
Speaker 116
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
Representative David Ray
Unverified
Speaker 129
Speaker 134
Speaker 141
Speaker 144
Speaker 147
Speaker 133
Speaker 150
Speaker 94
Speaker 46
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
Speaker 146
Speaker 172
Speaker 175
Speaker 179
Speaker 166
Speaker 203
Speaker 207
Speaker 210
Speaker 211
Speaker 85
Speaker 218
Speaker 222
Speaker 13
Speaker 226
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Speaker 231
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Speaker 232
Speaker 233
Speaker 236
Speaker 243
Speaker 124
Speaker 88
Speaker 245
Speaker 248
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Speaker 250
Speaker 93
Speaker 44
Speaker 252
Speaker 79
Speaker 267
Speaker 270
Speaker 240
Speaker 274
Speaker 163
Speaker 165
Speaker 12
Speaker 256
Speaker 290
Speaker 286
Ernestine Broadway
Unverified
Speaker 294
Speaker 196
Speaker 299
Speaker 303
Representative Carol Dalby
Unverified
Speaker 304
Speaker 311
Speaker 313
Speaker 316
Speaker 317
Speaker 241
Speaker 320
Speaker 324
Debbie Loggins
Unverified
Speaker 326
Speaker 24
Speaker 216
Speaker 329
Speaker 330
Speaker 331
Speaker 21
Speaker 333
Speaker 336
Speaker 339
Speaker 340
Speaker 343
Speaker 346
Speaker 347
Speaker 84
Speaker 352
Speaker 271
Speaker 362
Speaker 202
Speaker 365
Speaker 366
Speaker 34
Speaker 2
Speaker 215
Speaker 48