Is ENRON Hiring?
The following is posted at the request of Gus Hall...
In reviewing budget documents for 2005-2006 prepared by the City of Marfa, I was horrified, dumbfounded, amazed, bewildered, and finally just angry at the gross overstatement of city revenues by a not-so-small amount of $ 1,000,000.00 (that's right, one million dollars). This overstatement is not petty cash! Included in total gross revenues of the City were “Transfers” of $ 700,000.00 and the double counting of City tax revenues of $ 272,500.00. When in the world of accounting are “Transfers” a revenue? In as much as every day of the year a one million-dollar transfer could be recorded as a transfer-in and a transfer-out between funds, we could have revenues of $ 365,000.000.00! Of course this bookkeeping theory is bogus, and so are the revenue numbers prepared by someone at City Hall. What has been presented is just plain garbage and is such a gross felonious, material misstatement of reality that I can only conclude that there is some nefarious goings on at City Hall. Have we an ex-Enron employee working on our City budget who thinks that revenues are whatever you want them to be?
These bogus bookkeeping practices are not just a one-time event, or a slip of the pencil, or a failure to proof read. This bogus practice is repeated in the 2006-2007 City budget as well.
So who prepared these numbers? Our City Manager? Does he think we are idiots, or is he preparing his vita for his next job as a creative accountant at a corporate accounting firm? I can hear him now: “In just a year, I increased City revenue 40%.” Flo: why not a 100%?
Or maybe it’s our “independent” auditor: Dan, the Blindman, Painter. Does he think we are idiots or just dolts? Has he learned anything from his auditing failure in Sierra Blanca?
If it is our City Manager, he should be fired; if it is our auditor, he should not be re-hired.
In reviewing budget documents for 2005-2006 prepared by the City of Marfa, I was horrified, dumbfounded, amazed, bewildered, and finally just angry at the gross overstatement of city revenues by a not-so-small amount of $ 1,000,000.00 (that's right, one million dollars). This overstatement is not petty cash! Included in total gross revenues of the City were “Transfers” of $ 700,000.00 and the double counting of City tax revenues of $ 272,500.00. When in the world of accounting are “Transfers” a revenue? In as much as every day of the year a one million-dollar transfer could be recorded as a transfer-in and a transfer-out between funds, we could have revenues of $ 365,000.000.00! Of course this bookkeeping theory is bogus, and so are the revenue numbers prepared by someone at City Hall. What has been presented is just plain garbage and is such a gross felonious, material misstatement of reality that I can only conclude that there is some nefarious goings on at City Hall. Have we an ex-Enron employee working on our City budget who thinks that revenues are whatever you want them to be?
These bogus bookkeeping practices are not just a one-time event, or a slip of the pencil, or a failure to proof read. This bogus practice is repeated in the 2006-2007 City budget as well.
So who prepared these numbers? Our City Manager? Does he think we are idiots, or is he preparing his vita for his next job as a creative accountant at a corporate accounting firm? I can hear him now: “In just a year, I increased City revenue 40%.” Flo: why not a 100%?
Or maybe it’s our “independent” auditor: Dan, the Blindman, Painter. Does he think we are idiots or just dolts? Has he learned anything from his auditing failure in Sierra Blanca?
If it is our City Manager, he should be fired; if it is our auditor, he should not be re-hired.
posted by DanD at 10:55 AM
6 Comments:
IN A TYPE A GENERAL LAW MUNICIPALITY THE COUNCIL IS TO PREPARE THE BUDGET AND THE MAYOR'S JOB IS TO ASSURE THAT IT IS DONE PROPERLY. READ ON
Local Government Code 22.042 Powers and Duties of Mayor
(a) The mayor is the chief executive officer (NOT THE CHIEF FINANCIAL OFFICER AS THE MAYOR IS FOND OF DECLARING HIMSELF. AT THIS JUNCTURE HE MAY TRY TO SHY WIDELY FROM THIS STANCE) of the municipality. The mayor shall at all times actively ensure that the laws and ordinances of the municipality are properly carried out. The mayor shall perform the duties and exercise the powers prescribed by the governing body of the municipality.
(b) The mayor shall inspect the conduct of each subordinate municipal officer and shall cause any negligence, carelessness, or other violation of duty to be prosecuted and punished.
Furthermore, as Government 2306 lecture notes from Odessa College on local government practices points out, in a Weak Mayor form of government (as a type A general law municipality, Marfa is supposed to have a weak mayor, but I gather that Lanman is not capable of reading even elementary civics lessons since he has been advised to check the TML handbook and other online sources repeatedly and has not done so) it pointedly states that the "council as a collective group, prepares the city budget and selects department heads."
WHAT WE HAVE IS A CITY ADMINISTRATOR AND AUDITOR WHO HAVE CONSPIRED TO PREPARE THE BUDGET UNDERWRAPS WITH NO BUDGET WORKSHOPS, ALLOW THE COUNCIL TO HAVE COPIES OF THREE ITERATIONS OF THE BUDGET THE SAME WEEK IT IS PROPOSED FOR ADOPTION, AND A MAYOR WHO IS TOTALLY CLUELESS ABOUT EVERYTHING, INCLUDING THE $75K IN UNPAID BILLS. FLO DESPERATELY WANTS PAINTER TO BE THE AUDITOR...WHO ELSE CAN EVEN TRY TO COVER UP FOR HIM (REMEMBER SIERRA BLANCA)
May 13, 2005, BBS. It was reported that Flo was being given a $15,000 a year raise, and the quote came from his own mouth, "write and administer grants," if I recall correctly.
1. We had Tom Nance working on grant administration on the pool grant until the architect pointed out to Flo and the Mayor this was a conflict of interest per ORCA guidelines.
2. We have Meghan G. writing the last Solid Waste Grant on a "volunteer" basis. PS that grant was due on September 6 but wasn't approved by council until the last meeting.
3. The only grant Flo wrote was the first solid waste grant and all he has done so far is purchase a car under very shaky (and against grant procurement policies) procedure. And he blew past three deadlines on that grant but was allowed to submit any way.
4. Now he is advertising for a grant administrator. Tom Greenwood, the architect, I believe, is managing the library grant.
5. We find out we have paid Painter to work on closing out the ORCA grant which probably took some really fancy footwork. Flo maintained all the papers in a stack. For $15,000 a year, can't he sort them into files?
6. Actually we know for a fact that Flo and Painter worked at the computer together on the budget on many occasions.
7. And finally, to my accounting friends, did you see any fund set up for Grants other than a page that says Grants? Each Grant is supposed to have a separate page/fund to specifically monitor it per state guidelines.
Yeah, the blowhard "chief financial officer," "chief executive officer," and man who says, "I run these council meetings!" when he is trying to silence the public and the council members doesn't know how to read evidently. If he did, he would read any of the number of manuals that the state published to help morons like him run the city. The clear title that the state does give him is "BUDGET OFFICER." The buck stops with the budget officer. Well, he has passed the buck to Flo. He has abdicated his state-mandated responsibility to Flo. What did he do in May and June when he should have been preparing the first draft of the budget proposal as recommended by the comptroller? He was trying to sell us his lanman legacy landfill ideas. What did he learn as BUDGET OFFICER last year when he blew it and we started the year without a budget and missed the tax levy date to raise taxes for essential services? He leanrned NOTHING! We are at serious risk of missing the deadline again. This budget stuff must bore him. He is more interested in dumps than budgets. I say we dump him.
Wow! So was there peculation going on in Sierra Blanca?
Wow! Was there really peculation going on in Sierra Blanca?
Yes. The internal auditor in Hudspeth County pled guilty to theft in August 2003. The Texas Rangers investigated. She was also the purchasing agent conveniently. She was internal auditor for 18 years. Who was the independent auditor for the last ten years of her career in crime? You guessed it. CPA Dan Painter. I will post more on this subject later.
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