Writ of Mandamus time to force the Mayor to comply with the Mississippi Code? You betcha.
Special Meeting of the Bay St Louis City Council on Tap for This Evening
Tag: Writ of Mandamus
A few thoughts on last Tuesday night’s Bay City Council meeting
And since I’m well occupied with various and sundry multiple irons on the fire I’ll be as brief as possible:
- Ms. Hammond with the Metairie based accounting firm Carr Riggs and Ingram opened her remarks by disclosing the kind of service the firm was hired to perform and that service was an “agreed-upon procedures engagement“. If you follow the link you’ll find the service is pretty reflective of its name; the client provides the assertions that need to be tested and the CPA firm tests those assertions. Even better is what it isn’t: An audit including, except for very limited circumstances, a “compliance audit”.So what were the agreed upon procedures that Carr Riggs and Ingram was hired to perform? Easy folks, the US Department of Justice compliance review of the City’s Equitable Sharing Fund spells it out:
The proceeds received and spent should be included in the City’s annual financial audit as part of the Single Audit. However, certain requirements were inadequately reviewed during prior years’ audits, and the City, as directed by the DOJ, will engage a third-party to independently review and reconcile the DOJ funds equitable sharing account.
That verbiage is likely why the City Council voted to put the previous auditors professional liability carrier on notice of a claim.
- Considering no money had been expended from the Equitable sharing account reviewing and reconciling it was an easy job in taking the year end affidavits and tracing the revenues into the program. The math involves addition along with some rudimentary multiplication and division to calculate interest that should have been but was not credited to the DOJ fund. So you spend a day on site to make the calculation while Hizzoner blows copious amounts of smoke up the ol’ derriere. The resulting presentation, which was complete with smoke still emanating from Ms. Hammond’s hiney, appeared to be more an exercise in auditioning for the 2016 audit because her remarks went far beyond the scope of her work. As for the smoke believe you me I know first hand about it because I was literally next to her broadcasting the agreed upon procedures engagement report presentation on Periscope. Proof:
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Showdown: Tonight’s recess Bay City Council meeting in jeopardy (Updated)
Left unsaid in yesterday’s post but well explained in the video embed was the Bay City Council refusing to take up the City’s claims docket for approval until they were given access to the original invoices that support the docket they are being asked to approve. This routine vote is far from meaningless as personal liability attaches to any yes vote for any expenditure made without statutory authority and it is not an esoteric concept, especially if one carefully reads the Auditor’s internal control and legal compliance findings in the 2013-2014 audit report Mayor Fillingame is stonewalling because there is an open question in my mind if a money demand is not already coming to the Mayor and certain members of the City Council for reasons I will not disclose at this time. Given the pervasiveness and totality of the problems, self inflicted as they are, it would take a special kind of masochist to vote blind on the financial matters before the City Council.
I mention this because Slabbed has learned Councilman Boudin has not been given access to the original invoices supporting the current claims docket and according to email correspondence he sent that included the local media he will not be attending tonight’s recessed meeting of the City Council. Additional follow-up correspondence from Councilman at large Mike Favre which included the local media is suggesting the Council formally seek a Writ of Mandamus to force Mayor Fillingame to share the original public records supporting the claims docket with the City Council.
Stay tuned for updates on this rapidly developing situation.
Update:
