Makeup of social services audit panel criticized
From Sunshine Review
July 10, 2009 The Audit Review Committee invesitigating alleged misspending at the Department of Social Services has been criticized because two of its five members are county commissioners.[1]
[edit] The panel
The panel concluded that top Mecklenburg County managers took proper steps to address accounting failures, causing the makeup of the panel to come under scrutiny.
The two commissioners/panel members, County Manager Harry Jones and county general manager, John McGillicuddy, helped to write the report presented to the county board of commissioners this week.
Jones and McGillicuddy are the administrators on the committee and Commissioner Dan Murrey, commissioner Bill James and certified public accountant Ward Simmons join them on the committee.
“It seems odd to me that our county manager and an assistant county manager who reports to our county manager would be a part of a committee to make a determination about whether management responded appropriately,” Commissioner Harold Cogdell said. “It undermines to some extent … the appearance of what this committee is charged with having done.”
The members will look into whether they should remove administrators from the panel in the future, according to Murrey. Some commissioners have expressed concern that the arrangement undermines public confidence in the review as well as hinders the committee's ability zero in on the person to blame.
Supporters of allowing managers on the panel do not believe it compromises investigations. They think it allows administrators on the committee to give commissioners experienced knowledge about the daily workings of county government.
The Audit Review Committee was established in 1998 by county officials to oversee financial audits and make recommendations to the commissioners. In North Carolina, counties arrange the committee so that it must include two commissioners, two county administrators and a community member.
[edit] The investigation
The committee is doing an investigative review of DSS programs such as a Christmas charity that requested public donations. The county cannot account for tens of thousands of dollars from spending programs such as these, according to recent financial audits, and officials do not anticipate being able to learn what happened to that money due to missing or altered receipts.
The panel presented a report to the board of commissioners that criticizes DSS account practices, but endorses county manager-made reforms that were in response to problems auditors found.
McGillicuddy wrote a draft of the report, taking suggestions from other committee members, and James disagreed about what the panel members had concluded during discussion.
McGillicuddy’s draft suggested the panel found the DSS responses to the audit were appropriate and sufficient, while James suggested the report reflect that the DSS management’s responses to the audit were not appropriate and sufficient. Panel members Murrey and Simmons sided with McGillicuddy.
James said he unsuccessfully lobbied to keep county managers off the committee when it was formed. The presence of administrators prevents the panel from conducting fully independent investigations, he said.
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