The accounting and record keeping in the Omaha Fire Department has been so bad for so long, the Nebraska state auditor said he is unable to even do an audit. The state of the department's finances was made public at a news conference Thursday morning, called by Omaha Mayor Jim Suttle.
The main issue is the payroll process within the department which points to deficiencies in record keeping.
"The core question we are trying to address, was whether or not fire personnel are actually showing up for their required hours of duty," said State Auditor, Mike Foley.
There is no proof whether firefighters were working their assigned hours, which they were being paid for. "The short answer is that the time reporting system utilized by the Omaha Fire Department is inadequate and unreliable, and it's probably been that way for a very long time," said Foley.
Because of this, Foley says a full audit of the department is not appropriate use of public funds at this time. He says the accounting records are not in an auditable condition.
According to the city and Omaha Mayor Jim Suttle, there is no reason to believe the lack of records is intentional by any employees in the department. "You work with the problems that you have in processes, and much of what you're seeing here at city is a process problem, it's not a people problem," said Suttle.
"Just because there isn't documentation, doesn't mean that there's any deliberate attempt or it's probably shoddy, I think is the word that I've heard," said City Finance Director, Pam Spaccarotella. "I mean it's simply the right procedures aren't in place."
But a local citizens group doesn't agree. Dave Nabity with the Omaha Alliance for the Private Sector had this to say Thursday afternoon.
"You're telling me that these people aren't smart enough to figure out how to use technology to keep track of their employees? It's ridiculous, they did it that way so they could game the system and take advantage of the taxpayers."
Nabity says his group brought the fire department problems to the state auditor's attention after the group did its own investigation between August and October 2009. He says concerns expressed by firefighters started the investigation.
"We were looking for mis-management, we were looking for fraud, we were looking for crimes. We were looking for just things that were going wrong inside the department because we kept hearing there were big, big problems," said Nabity.
Nabity says after the investigation revealed all of those things, his group sat down with Omaha Mayor Jim Suttle to discuss the findings. "And the word we got from the mayor was I've investigated it all, there's no problems there. It's all hearsay and it's all bologna and basically leave it alone," described Nabity.
Questions now remain about the possibility of the effect on pension payouts for firefighters. State auditor Mike Foley says there's no way to assess what the lack of records is costing taxpayers at this time. "We haven't done an analysis of what the payroll impact might have been, in some of that, because you can't prove one way or the other, how many of those hours were actually worked, because of the way the records were being kept."
Another issue is the lack of documentation within a donor supported "Kloewer Fund." It was established to collect private donations for the fire department, but there are no records to show what the funds should be used for. For instance, $4,500 were used to throw a Firemen's Ball, but there is no indication that was proper use of the money.
The city says the Kloewer Fund will be discontinued and those funds will be managed by a not-for-profit company. The city has also appointed a new accountant to the fire department, who will be overseen by Spaccarotella.
Fire Chief Mike McDonnell was present at the news conference and said his firefighters work hard for the city. "You have 650 firefighters that are dedicated to serve the citizens of Omaha," said McDonnell. "People show up on their shifts, not only do they show up for their shifts, but they'll stay after hours without requesting overtime."
He says the city has gone 22 months, a new record, without losing anyone in a fire, which shows his department's dedication to their jobs.
Dave Nabity has many things to say about Chief McDonnell's role in all of this, including this comment. "We believe that chief should be fired for running his department so bad."
During the Thursday press conference, auditor Mike Foley also expressed frustration about a "lack of cooperation" from two key union department personnel. Those personnel, one being fire union president Steve LeClair, were called in for an interview with employees of the auditor's office. They showed up with their attorney who advised them not to answer any questions.
The Omaha Fire Fighters Union issued a statement Thursday. In part, it read, "Local 385 wishes to set the record straight on certain public comments of the Nebraska State Auditor, Mr. Mike Foley. Today [Thursday] Foley released a report that tells half the story about the Association's participation in an audit of fire department finances and record keeping. We received Mr. Foley's questions in writing from the mayor's office and because those questions were directed to Steve LeClair, he responded to them in writing and under oath on Friday, October 22nd... This audit has clearly been politically motivated from its inception... People can make up their own mind about whether this "audit" was a political fishing expedition or an honest attempt to ascertain the truth. Either way, we continue will (sic) to serve the best interests of our members and to protect their safety and the safety of the citizens we serve."
