Tuesday, December 9, 2014

Council Majority Rejects Forensic Audit

A proposed forensic audit failed to win council approval Monday, an outcome Mayor Adrian O. Mapp said.he found "sad and appalling."

Council members Tracey Brown, Vera Greaves, Gloria Taylor, William Reid and Council President Bridget Rivers voted "no." Cory Storch and Rebecca Williams voted "yes."

Reid said he felt Mapp, City Administrator Rick Smiley and Finance Director Ron West could do the job of finding irregularities, while others asked why Supplee, Clooney, the firm that conducts annual city audits, could not conduct the forensic audit. A council majority appeared to be willfully ignoring the administration's explanation that a forensic audit was not the same as an annual audit based on information provided by the city, but examined all fiscal operations for fraud and waste.

The audit would have covered fiscal operations from 2006 through mid-2014, including several years where the city had no chief financial officer. Brown, who is the pastor of former Mayor Sharon Robinson-Briggs, condemned the forensic audit as an attempt to embarrass and harass her administration. She called the $60,000 cost "a lot of money to desecrate someone's character."

Taylor alluded to "political shenanigans" and said, " I am not going to be part of that backbite and dirty politics."

"If there's fraud, you begin to deal with it from now on," she said.

Williams offered examples of possible mismanagement, the spending of "$460,000 in three weeks" to outfit the Tepper's basement, the "$125,000 Quad Tech deal" and alleged fraud in the Recreation Division in 2012.

Smiley said the forensic audit was not "backbiting" but was about "financial integrity."

Storch said he did not see the audit as political and he wanted it to cover the years when there was no CFO.

In public comment, Dr. Harold Yood said the vote gave the public the impression that those who rejected the audit were "co-conspirators."

"I'm very ashamed of your vote," he said.

--Bernice

20 comments:

  1. This is beginning of the Sharon for mayor campaign three years from now.

    ReplyDelete
  2. A forensic audit should go back to at least 1998, when the fraud surrounding the solid waste portion of the Inter Local Agreement with PMUA unhinged the authority from the reporting and transparency requirements of the contract, and secretly reversed solid waste cash flows between the two local government units. As for the auditors, the City's and PMUA's need replacing, both for the above reason, as well as for the cushy relationship that often develops between auditors and their clients if they are retained year after year after year. Best practices, as spelled out by the State Comptroller, suggests that competitive solicitations for auditing firms occur once every five years, and in no circumstances should the same firm be retained for more than 10-years maximum.

    http://www.nj.gov/comptroller/news/docs/080812.pdf

    ReplyDelete
  3. unbelievable! All the more reason I am glad to leave this town. The city council are helping to cover up the incompetence and possibly worse behavior of the past few years.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Why not ask the state for help on this one? If there are strong indications of mismanagement then "mismanagement " becomes a state and federal crime. What is stopping those who want a forensic audit from turning documents to the state? Inquiring minds would like to know.

    ReplyDelete
  5. one can only wonder how much of this stolen tax payer money went into the pockets of the 'no' voters

    ReplyDelete
  6. To Mr. Goldstein I couldn't agree with you more. To anon 7:04am you are on target also.

    ReplyDelete
  7. "Brown, who is the pastor of former Mayor Sharon Robinson-Briggs, condemned the forensic audit as an attempt to embarrass and harass her administration."

    Councilwoman, you represent ALL of Plainfield, not just your friend Sharon. You have done a great disservice to the citizens you represent by letting your personal feelings rule your decision. You, as well as your fellow council members who voted against this, are clueless to how finances and this city should be run. But, Plainfield, you want 'em, you got 'em!

    ReplyDelete
  8. This council is a huge waste of time for all. If they had no intention of voting for this, why did they move it forward? Isn't the point of the agenda setting session to put down items that the council wants to vote on? And if you don't know what you are voting for - which is most evident here - why are you voting.

    Why did the administration have to tell you about a forensic audit? What do you do for your measly 10K? NOTHING!!!!!

    ReplyDelete
  9. I am not surprised by most of the not votes and am surprised of one no vote as it seems morally wrong. It is sad to see such people on the City Council who won't back the fiscal integrity of Plainfield. I teach accounting and I used the way Sharon ran Plainfield finances as examples to my students of how to be investigated and arrested. I hope the state will take over and lock those up who participated in ripping off Plainfield. The "No" voters have no shame, so I guess they will make it in politics in the most corrupt state in the union.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Alan is right, the forensic audit should go back to 1998 and the start of the PMUA. It would also be nice if it was broadened to include the PMUA in the audit. One thing appears to very clear; "Jerry's Kids"(Rivers, Greaves, Reid, Brown, and Taylor) will never fund a Forensic Audit. They don’t want their friends and family members caught with their hands in the Plainfield ‘cookie jar’. What’s more, Jerry Green doesn’t want the public to know how Plainfield City budget is used to fund his friends and political allies. The City and PMUA budgets together are about $100 Million dollars a year. That’s a lot of pork for family and friends if you control the purse strings and no one gets to see where the money really goes. By now it should be clear to everyone that Plainfield is run as corruptly as it is because the people in power, their families, friends, and allies make so much money from the City because it is run this way. And as he freely admits, Jerry Green runs Plainfield. So as long as Jerry Green and ‘his kids” are in power nothing is going to change in Plainfield. He has it too good they way things are to ever change them.

    Tom Kaercher

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I suppose it’s okay for the Campbells to run the school board with a budget that is well over 75 million, with no oversight. I don’t see anyone complaining about that. After all that’s tax payers money. What double standards.

      Delete
    2. To 1:20pm - Except that the city (mayor and council) have no oversight over the BOE. There is no double standard, just you not understanding the structure.

      Delete
  11. Tom, Give me a break, sour grapes these people did not vote for you for PMUA so you are just ripping them. You people are in denial I agree with the council just an attempt to get back at Sharon at the taxpayer's expense.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. That's because you know nothing of what went on in her administration.

      Want to pay my taxes, which increased (she put in an increase of 7%) because she had no clue what she was doing.

      Delete
  12. The employees know where the funds were not properly spent. Why not just ask and have an internal done to get things back on track?

    ReplyDelete
  13. Mayor Mapp is doing what SRB did. He has spent money after the council sain NO with John Stewart. Taking money from one account to put in another and by passing the account budget process. Gerry Green has taught the Democrats well

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Again, you know nothing of the process. The council gave the mayor money and he spent it within the rules of how he could, which included John Stewart.

      Sharon, on the other hand, spent money whether the council gave it to her or not.

      Do your homework before you put forth an opinion.

      Delete
  14. Let me understand the rationale. If someone commits a crime last year, or prior to last year, we are to say.."Its done. Let's move on". It is certainly an expedient way to empty the jails. Bill Kruse

    ReplyDelete
  15. It's a little difficult to vote for the audit that may find irregularities under the previous administration when Sharon is sitting right there staring them in the face. She left soon after the vote failed. If she didn't have anything to fear there would have been no problem looking closer at the books. So obviously they think something may be found. That makes it very obvious why they voted no.

    ReplyDelete
  16. Am I wrong or has the Courier News not included a word about the Council's action? What's that about?

    ReplyDelete