Then those of you that get part of your daily news on Slabbed are really missing out. First off I want to give Taylor a WordPress platform tip so that the posts and comment time stamps are expressed in local time. From your dashboard go to “settings”, then click “general” on the sub-menu. On your general settings tab change the timezone to “UTC-5” from the drop down menu. You can thank me later.
On Sunday, Taylor posted his take on the Board of Supervisor’s recent Public Relations push with legal consultant Billy Guice on the point for the Sups. The post was good but the comments to Taylor’s post, as is often the case on an interactive website, are out of this world and I think are a must read.
My personal opinion is most everyone on the outside looking in at the Singing River financial disaster without a financial dog in the hunt, especially informed financial observers spot the self-serving duplicity in how both the Supervisors and the SRHS Board of Trustees are trying to frame the management perpetrated accounting fraud which lays at the heart of financial crisis that grips the hospital.
At its most basic, both the Sups and the SHRS Trustees are trying to scapegoat the former auditors and the retirees for the bad business practices and fraudulent financial reporting which occurred under former CEO Chris Anderson’s and CFO Mike Crews’ watch at the helm of SRHS. It is a shame the old time practice of tarring and feathering has gone out of style because I can think of five Supervisors (Stupidvisors in RFP speak) that deserve a good tarring, feathering before being run out of town on a rail. These are strong words but I am an informed financial observer so the bullshit is easy to spot. Let’s start with April Havens over at the Mississippi Alabama Press:
Jackson County supervisors this morning announced they are suing KPMG, Singing River Health System’s former audit firm whose work led to a disastrous $88 million accounting adjustment.
Supervisors today hired attorney Billy Guice on a contingent fee basis to represent the county in its suit against the audit firm.
KPMG has been the scapegoat of choice for both the SRHS Board when the financial fraud (though it was not reported as such by the Mississippi Alabama Press) first came to light back in March, 2014 as County Comptroller Josh Eldridge, reportedly a CPA that previously worked for the State Auditor’s office took point for the Sups spinning the management perpetrated financial fraud just days after Chris Anderson abruptly left Singing River Health for Baptist in Jackson:
“It’s a large adjustment,” county Comptroller Josh Eldridge said.
Board attorney Jessica Dupont noted, however, that the county doesn’t know of a current lawsuit.
The health system is county-owned, and the county backs its debt, but county tax dollars do not fund the system’s operations. The county has five mills pledged in case the health system ever defaults on its debt, but Eldridge noted the system is “not even close” to default.
That tune has since changed with regard to the bonds being in default, such condition also present when Eldridge made those initial statements. Now back to Jackson County’s announcement that they were suing KPMG as Guice literally beclowns himself before the financial and auditing community as he lists two grounds for the suit:
Last week, Guice said the audits did not appropriately disclose the state of the pension in the annual audits. That information should have been presented in the audit highlights at the beginning of the document, he said.
Instead, the most important information was buried in the “notes” section at the end of the audit, he said.
Now at this point I’m going to put on my professional hat as a CPA/Auditor but I’m going to express the concepts in the language used by an 8 year old so that maybe some of this sinks in with the Stupidvisors, who I would highly encourage to run by their in-house financial expert Josh Eldridge.
The “front part” of the audit is called “Management Discussion and Analysis“. You see boys and girls, in an audit there are two teams. One team is called management. The boys and girls that belong to Team Management work at the hospital. These people include doctors and nurses that cure your bobos and hurts. It also includes the boys and girls that manage the hospital. The other team is called the “auditors” and that team includes the boys and girls that make sure the Hospital reports its cures of bobos and hurts accurately for everyone most everyone for just a few people to see.
Now back to grownup talk for the professionals that read this website. Continue reading “If you’re not reading SRHS Trustee Scott Taylor’s blog…..”