LITTLE ROCK — The director of the Legislative Audit Division is considering having a former mayor of Helena-West Helena held in contempt for failing to appear as subpoenaed to answer lawmakers’ questions Thursday.
Director Roger Norman said it is the first instance he is aware of in which a city official when subpoenaed failed to appear before the Legislative Joint Auditing Committee. Norman has been with the division for 35 years.
“It’s rare for us to issue a subpoena but we do it for a reason,” Norman said. “When individuals disregard those subpoenas there needs to be a way to enforce it or hold those people in contempt.”
Former Mayor James Valley said by phone after the meeting that he told the division at least a week ago that he had court cases scheduled and would not be able to attend.
“I do not believe that my actions are contemptuous to any measure,” Valley said. “I was in court. I practice law to make a living and I'm not a city official at this point.”
Norman said he will discuss with the committee chairmen what to do, but the ultimate decision is Norman’s.
“Probably there will be some kind of motion filed or complaint filed with the circuit court here in P ulaski County,” Norman said.
He said it will be up to the court whether Valley had a valid reason for not appearing.
Legislative Audit’s Committee on Counties and Municipalities had subpoenaed Valley, City Clerk Sandra Ramsey, former Treasurer Michael Boone, former District Court Clerk Linda Danley and former Police Chief Fred Fielder to testify before the committee about the city’s 2010 audit.
Valley was the only one who did not attend the meeting.
The audit found several problems including:
$11,347 improperly disbursed to elected officials, employees, vendors or other individuals. Also, two checks from Valley worth $3,666 to reimburse the city for improper reimbursements in 2006 that bounced.
$231,049 in disbursements paid to hotels, restaurants or businesses without enough documentation.
$108,610 paid by debit card rather than prenumbered checks as required by Arkansas law.
$17,839 in payments either to family members of city employees or employee-owned businesses.
$7,701 in bank overdraft fees.
$61,730 to a local construction company for building repairs, wherein invoices for the repairs list the company performing the same service multiple times.
Omissions and errors in the city’s financial records, including misstatements of $2.8 million in the fund balance, $2.3 million in revenue and $2.16 million in expenditures.
$1.29 million in state aid for streets that was used as general revenue.
The general fund had a negative fund balance of $2.29 million as of Dec. 31, 2010.
The audit report findings have been referred to the prosecuting attorney and the city attorney, committee staff member June Barron said.
The former officials and Ramsey, who has been city clerk since 2006, all attributed the problems to a lack of training and said they didn’t believe any illegal behavior took place.
Ramsey said the community is still struggling to reconcile itself as a single city. Helena and West Helena merged in 2006.
“Consolidating two cities was quite the paperwork nightmare,” Ramsey said. “We’ve made a lot of strides.”
Still, she said the city is still struggling, pointing out that she was short for payroll today and would have to draw the money from an emergency account.
“We don’t want to be the first city in Arkansas to go Chapter 9” and declare bankruptcy, she said. “Our town is broke just like a lot of other little towns.”
Rep. Stephen Meeks, RGreenbrier, hard harsh words for Valley: “It sounds like looking at some of this stuff he was using the city as his own personal piggy bank.”
Seeing the length of the report, Rep. Michael Patterson, D-Piggott, said, “This seems like the biggest mess we’re ever gotten into here.”
Poor financial records and political infighting marked the area even before the cities merged. Since 2006, the city has had audit findings year after year. The 2011 audit, which was completed this week, also has findings, but some problems identified in the 2010 audit have been resolved, Ramsey said.
Valley, who was the first mayor after the cities merged, said he is done. He left office in January 2011.
“I'm just not at this point interested in being involved in city politics,” Valley said. “I don't see the need to spend five hours of my day [driving] to talk to some people I don't know for five-10 minutes about some stuff that happened three years ago. It's just not a practical burden they’re placing on me as a private citizen.”
Front Section, Pages 1 on 10/12/2012