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Saturday, February 02, 2008

WBOC Reports On Salisbury City Audit

http://www.wboc.com/Global/category.asp?C=42944&nav=menu222_1

Reported by Kevin Leahy

Salisbury City Audit Finds $10 Million Misreported

02/01/2008 6:10 PM ET

SALISBURY, Md. - After a month of delays, the city audit of Salisbury finds more than $10 Million of misreported money.

The amount is the total of two transactions of money coming into the city, from a bond worth $5.3 Million and a lease worth $4.9 Million.

Mayor Barrie Tilghman took responsibility for the oversight, saying an inexperienced financial department never balanced some city accounts properly. City Administrator John Pick explained the money was never missing, but that staff misunderstood when to balance accounts.

"They thought they were doing it correctly but they were not. They thought those adjustments were supposed to be made at the end of the year, but that's not correct. That's corrected now," said Pick, who noted the adjustments are supposed to be made each month.

Pick said the money accumulated over a period of seven months that way. He said the city is unscathed financially, because proper accounts were established to correct interest, but the proper follow-through never happened."You've got to do both step-one and step-two. We did step-one, but did not do step-two," furthered Pick, who said it's reasons like this that the city is audited in the first place.

Still, Council member Debbie Campbell says she intends to get to the bottom of the problem at the council's next meeting on Feb. 4.

Campbell said, "This is serious. This management letter is serious. And, on Monday night I expect full answers to the Council's questions. I want to set the city's finances in good order."

Despite the error, Mayor Tilghman says everyone within the financial department will keep their job.

GO HERE to read the AUDIT!

I Told You There Was A Scam In The Making With IRS Messages!

From: refundtax@irs.org (Internal Revenue Service (IRS))

Internal Revenue Service (IRS) United States Department of the Treasury

Date: 2/2/2008

After the last annual calculations of your fiscal activity we have determined that you are eligible to receive a tax refund under section 501(c) (3) of the Internal Revenue Code. Tax refund value is $375.20. Please submit the tax refund request and allow us 6-9 days in order to IWP the data received.A refund can be delayed for a variety of reasons. For example submitting invalid records or applying after the deadline.
If you distribute funds to other organization, your records must show wether they are exempt under section 497 (c) (15). In cases where the recipient org. is not exempt under section 497 (c) (15), you must have evidence the funds will be used for section 497 (c) (15) purposes.
If you distribute fund to individuals, you should keep case histories showing the recipient's name and address; the purpose of the award; the maner of section; and the realtionship of the recipient to any of your officers, directors, trustees, members, or major contributors.

To access the form for your tax refund, please click here
Sincerely, Kirsten MailowDirector, Exempt. OrganizationRulings and Agreements LetterInternal Revenue ServiceDocument reference (92054568).

Note:▪ For security reasons, we will record your ip address, the date and time.▪ Deliberate wrong imputs are criminally pursued and indicted.© Copyright 2008, Internal Revenue Service U.S.A.

The IRS Does NOT contact you about this. IF YOU get a message like this, DELETE IT! You've been warned! Joe

Send Your Concerns LOUD & CLEAR!

City by law must send its audit for State review to this:

OFFICE OF LEGISLATIVE AUDITS
301 West Preston St., Room 1202,
Baltimore, MD 21201

The Office reviews the audit reports of all county and municipal governments and community colleges (Code State Government Article, secs.2-1201 through 2-1222).

Citizens enmasse should write/email/call the following to express theirconcern regarding Salisbury's audit:

Bruce A. Myers, Legislative Auditor
(410) 946-5900, (301) 970-5900e-mail: bmyers@ola.state.md.us fax: (410) 946-5999, (301) 970-5999

PRESS RELEASE On Pam Oland, FINANCIAL ADVISOR TO THE CITY, MAYOR


GO HERE to see the Press Release!

Under the Excellent Leadership of Pam Oland ...

How many times have we heard Salisbury Mayor Barrie Tilghman preface a statement with those very same words? If Pam Oland was so competent, why was the FY 2007 audit almost four (4) months late?

This time last year Tilghman was making excuses for the FY 2006 audit being five months late. In fact, the city council had to move the deadline so that it wouldn't have been even later.

If Ms. Oland is so competent, why were accounts not reconciled properly?

If Ms. Oland is so competent, why were two accounts totaling $10.2 million simply missing from the city's ledger?

Time and again, Tilghman and Oland have been asked by certain members of the city council if the Finance Department needed more staff. They were ask if temporary staff was needed to help get the audit in accurately and on time.

The answer was no. Tilghman feels that it is a far better use of tax dollars to reward her sycophants with promotions and pay raises than it is to be a faithful steward of the taxpayers' hard earned money.

One of Tilghman's (and Oland's) latest excuses is that Oland is overworked. She's responsible for finance, procurement, for HR. This is government at its finest. Ms. Oland can't perform her duties as Finance Chief properly, so give her more responsibility.

If you don't believe me, ask Tilghman. On February 7, 2007 Tilghman is quoted in the Tilghman Times, "But I am confident (Oland) has done everything that needs to be done
to make sure going forward that everything is in order."

I love Tilghman's confidence. It's February, 2008 and the audit is about to be presented to the city council. Oland and her personnel committed errors that only amounted to MILLIONS of DOLLARS.

A month later, in March of 2007, Tilghman felt that audit completion should not be a problem when they start working on the next audit in September (2007). Of course, the next audit was not only completed late (again), but the Finance Department had material errors in the work that was presented to auditors.

But I'm sure that we'll all be reading about how everything will be just fine - next year. ... under the excellent leadership of Pam Oland.

cross posted at Delmarva Dealings

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