RAYTOWN'S LEADING NEWS SOURCE
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| BY GREG WALTERS |
Foretold City’s
Reporting Problems
Two
more issues have come to light in the wake of the TIF Tax Dispute between the Fire
District and the City of Raytown.
In 2013
the City of Raytown hired the auditing firm Cochran Head Vick and Co., P.C.
to conduct the required annual audit of the city’s books for the 2013/2014 fiscal year.
On
April 25, 2015, Cochran Head released its audit report to the city.
In the
Auditor’s management letter the firm recommended the City improve its end of
the year reporting procedures to “ensure that transactions are properly
recorded in generally accepted accounting principles.”
The
Report cited that “adjustments were not initially identified by the City’s
internal controls over financial reporting.”
The
Auditor’s Report stated . . . “Year-end policies were not sufficient to
identify the adjustments noted above in a timely manner.”
Auditors
also reported the non-compliance of proper reporting procedures could cause
problems for the city. They wrote: “Potential exists for material misstatements
to the financial statements.”
To view
the entire report from Cochran Head Vick and Co., P.C. go to the City of
Raytown Website at www.raytown.mo.us
( 1)
In
the “search” box of the home page type in AUDIT.
( 2)
Go
to CITY FINANCIAL INFORMATION
( 3)
Go
to 2013/2014 AUDIT
( 4)
To
view the comments go to PAGE 71 - 79
The
audit clearly shows the City’s management team was aware that year-end reports
were not being filed in a timely manner. So there is no question staff was
aware of the need for improvement.
The
question remains . . . why weren’t the needed safeguards put in place to make
certain the reports were not completed in a timely manner?
Last
October the Raytown Fire District questioned why reports were not being made in
a timely manner to the State of Missouri as regards certain TIF projects in
Raytown. According to Fire Department officials, their inquiries were met with
stonewalling tactics. Unable to find the information from the City, the
Department made inquiries to the State of Missouri.
Only
after the City began to feel the heat of the State Auditor’s office did the
city file the delinquent reports.
The
City Administrator’s assertion that staff turnover is the cause of the problem
does not ring true. The same City Staff that reviewed the 2013/2014 Audit was
in place as when the Fire Department began its inquiries.
In
other words, no progress was made during the ensuing months after the audit
found fault with the city’s reporting procedures.
The
failure of the City to file financial reports concerning TIF projects and tax
abatements could put future community projects in jeopardy.
Most of
the Raytown governing body, including the Mayor and at least seven of the
Raytown Board of Aldermen conducted reform based campaigns to win election.
They
should take a serious look at why the audit recommendations were ignored.
Fire
District Petition for
Audit Picking up Steam
Barb
Schlapia, Vice President of the Raytown Fire Protection District Board of
Governors, told the Raytown Report the petition drive is well under way for an
Audit of the City of Raytown’s books by the State Auditor’s office.
“Over
600 signatures have been gathered,” Schlapia told the Raytown Report.
An
estimated 1,370 signatures are required to bring a State Audit of the city’s
finances.
She
also said the Fire District Board of Governors has decided to withhold tax
receipt payments to the City of Raytown for TIF projects within the City until
the issue is resolved.
The
Fire District maintains the City has over-billed the District for its share of
tax receipts for the 350 Live TIF. Most readers will recognize the Tax District
as the one which includes Walmart on 350 Highway.
Anyone
interested in signing the petition can do so by going to Fire Station Number One
located at 6020 Raytown Trafficway to
sign or pick up petitions for a State Audit.
One of
my jobs at the Raytown Report is to review upcoming agendas of the Raytown
Board of Aldermen. They will be meeting this Tuesday, so, I checked out the
agenda.
An item
caught my eye that did not make much sense.
A
resolution before the Board of Aldermen asks for $95,913.00 to pay a project
consultant to oversee the building of a new Downtown Raytown Streetscape.
Which
caused me to wonder, can’t one of our city engineer’s do the inspections, fill
out the reports and save the taxpayers about $100 grand for the trouble.
While
we are on the subject of the City Streetscape, I wonder what Raytowners think
of the plan to have vertical parking along 63rd Street.
Not
that I am opposed to vertical parking. It works in other cities, it should work
here.
But the
plan to require all vehicles to pull in backwards does not seem to be a good
plan. First of all, I have never heard of such a requirement anywhere. And I
have been around for quite awhile.
This
may come as a news flash to the planners at City Hall, but a lot of older
people have trouble pulling their vehicle into a spot backwards.
The reason is simple.
As you age, your mobility and flexibility become limited. It is a heck of a lot easier to pull head on into a vertical parking spot. It is not easy to shoe-peg your car backwards into a parking space – particularly if you have trouble turning your head around to keep from hitting the cars parked on either side.
The reason is simple.
As you age, your mobility and flexibility become limited. It is a heck of a lot easier to pull head on into a vertical parking spot. It is not easy to shoe-peg your car backwards into a parking space – particularly if you have trouble turning your head around to keep from hitting the cars parked on either side.
Just my
point of view.
What do
you think?
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Comments
Westport and Main (where the old Katz was), and the 300 and 400 blocks of Delaware along the streetcar line in KCMO among other places.
A google search for "back in angle parking" comes up with over 8,000,000 hits.
Facts
PARKING PROS AND CONS
Advantages:
Reverse angled parking, which requires drivers to back into spaces, can have these advantages:
• Car doors do not open in front of oncoming traffic as happens with parallel parking.
• Children and pets exiting a vehicle are blocked by car doors from going toward the traffic and instead go toward the sidewalk.
• Because cars are backed in, people can unload the trunks while standing on the sidewalk rather than in the street.
• More parking spaces can be created on a city block than with parallel parking.
• Drivers have more visibility when pulling out of the spaces.
Disadvantages:
• If reverse angled parking replaces parallel parking, a street is likely to lose one lane of traffic and, in some cases, may have to become one way.
• If reverse angled parking replaces front-in angled parking, there is no increase in parking spots.
• To get into a reverse angled space, a driver must stop just ahead of the space and use a right turn signal to indicate an intention to park. Drivers in the same lane behind that car must stop and wait or may be unable to back up. Those same conditions occur with parallel parking, though.
Reverse angled parking requires drivers to back into the spaces. When replacing parallel parking, it creates more spots but it can also eliminate a lane of traffic.
On 6th Street in Austin, however, business owners want their front-end angled parking spaces back.
“Everybody who comes in complains about it,” said Eric Jones, a clerk at Wiggy's Liquor Store — where 900 customers have signed a petition to get rid of the back-in spaces.
He estimates the store has seen a 20 percent decline in customers because they do not want to contend with the back-in parking.
Andy Whiteman
I wonder if those two Alderman that are running for State Rep have thought about how this is not going to help get them any votes.
Above is the hype that they use for back in parking, I agree we do not need back in parking, I will use stores in that area less than I already do.
It has troubled me for years that the event was at a church and even more so that a non-profit was charging the school.
Doesn't that make them a for profit and therefore shouldn't they pay taxes like everyone else.
Did the school quit the church or did the church kick the school out? Think about how many problems there have been at the graduations. There have been numerous arrests, guns pulled, adults inappropriately dressed, profanity shouted in the church, and other stupid behavior. If I was the minister at that church, I wouldn't want that kind of activity in my church either.
By the way, any adults inappropriately dressed were not allowed in the graduation ceremony. They either had to leave or watch it on TV in a room far removed from the ceremony. Not an issue.
Guns pulled? Really? When? I recall reading about a fight or two over the years but guns were never mentioned.
If that is not sufficient, maybe Raytown should consider a public parking lot. The city owns a rather large vacant area where the Old Baptist Church used to be that could be used for parking. Using that site would eliminate the expense of tearing up 63rd Street and the dangers of reverse parking.
Andy Whiteman
It works like this. They do not follow the state laws on reports. They do not even follow the advise of their own auditors on making the reports.
I really wonder how many people ran up to city hall or called their aldermen to tell them they want back in vertical parking in Downtown Raytown? I'd wager it was very few if any at all.
Don't you get it? They are going to ignore what they want to ignore. They are going to do what the want to do. They really do not care what the public thinks. It is given they do not believe in following state laws.
"Without proper controls in place over the reporting of Federal awards, Federal grants may not be properly reported on the SEFA in the Single Audit report. Not only could that lead to an audit finding for the organization, but the organization could be at risk of losing future funding for those programs and/or may have to repay funds back to the grantor that were already received."
What are they doing up there? I hope everyone signs the audit petition!
Over the past three weeks I have noticed the following news trends;
The School District appears to be flush with cash and committed to buying up commercial property all over town, funny thing is I do not remember any of that mentioned when they renewed the bonds last year. This money they have to throw around is ours and we should have a say in how it is spent.
The City seems to be bankrupt in every sense of the word. They are bankrupt when it comes to accountability, they are bankrupt when it comes to transparency, they are bankrupt when it comes to leadership and soon they are going to be bankrupt when it comes to finance. The 350 deal is so bad that in 4 years 1/2 of the City budget will go just to paying the bonds back. This is compounded by the fact the City has been servicing the loan for the past 9 years with money they borrowed initially. The is to the tune of 8 million dollars and worst of all this money is not available to develop the rest of the property which is needed to generate the funds required to service this loan.
Lastly, some aldermen and one local paper has been attacking the fire department for making all of this an issue, yet in last weeks paper it was reported the fire department is working to save taxpayers $650,000.00 by refinancing their bonds. If this was the School District or the City they would have pocketed the money instead of returning it to the citizens.
Why are we allowing this to continue?
Our elected officials need to go in and clean house from top to bottom starting with the city administrator.
They need to recall the citizen spoke last April and agreed to keep this a 4th class city and a 4th class city doesn't need or have the money for a city administrator.
Sorry folks, but just because you call someone a professional doesn't make them one, which means they are not a top performer either.
From there we can do a lot of cleaning of unneeded management positions starting in departments that have 1 supervisor for every 1 or 2 employees.
We can make Raytown great again, but we first must all agree there are NO professionals at city hall. Part of that is the Bower Administration of patting failure on the back and thinking no one would catch on as long as the word "Professional" was over used. The other part is acting like we cannot live without a city administrator. The city did great without one for years and oddly didn't get into all this financial trouble until we decided to add one. Our current on has had one after another excuses why not to move here, would leave here if he didn't get a $30,000 raise when everyone was told there would be no raises and gets our elected officials to do dog tricks about how great he is for just doing his job, which is what it is to go and find grants for the citizen.
I would explain top performers and going beyond, but clearly that concept is far to great for our elected officials to understand or the city administrator would have been gone over 10 years ago.
Andy Whiteman
1. What businesses are we supposed to be backing up to? An ancient Rx biz and an insurance agent? Walgreens is awesome and Progressive if less costly.
2. The school district is playing real estate games, drug testing kids, etc. At what point are they planning on addressing being third from the bottom on the list of kc metro schools?
Maybe we could have something to be proud about.
Oh, and I won't back into a parking spot downtown. All I need is for some fool to try to go around me when I'm trying to back up, hit me and claim it's my fault
Your son will thank you someday for keeping close rein on him and teaching him respect of himself and adults. I do understand parents having to work a lot . But so many then don't even take the time to converse with their children when they do return home. Many are from single parents but it can be done; I know I was a single parent and my daughter is also. The kids have chores and are only unsupervised for a small amount of time with way to many chores to fit into that time. It is hard for the students who want to learn and the teachers who are trying to teach when students are being disruptive with violent fights in the class room. One of the reasons I quit teaching in the public schools.
I have followed the news and read city info
It is obvious a lot of projects are getting started finally, including the 59th street sidewalk
But all you all want to do is complain
There seems to be a knee jerk reaction by some who write on this blog to resort to name calling like "complainer" when someone asks a legitimate question.
In the last couple of days there have been questions about projects that are supposed to improve Blue Ridge Boulevard and sidewalks on 59th Street.
No one has stepped up from city hall to give even a hint of a timeline on the projects.
Why not?!?
In the scope of things those two projects are a lot more important than back in vertical parking.
They deserve to be answered.
I know this blog is read by people at city hall that should give the answer to those questions but for some reason do not give the answer.
Why not?!?
Speaking of questions can someone confirm that our city public relations person owns a business and if so where?
My thought is she doesn't want to answer questions at city hall maybe she will when people show up at her business and maybe she will learn to do the job that she is be paid for with our tax dollars.
NO, this is not a complaint it is FACT she does not like to answer questions.
Is PR person job to answer questions?
I have heard from over 5 people just this week she will not answer questions and has started to screen her calls.
Why is she still working for the city with an attitude like this?
Maybe you are over reacting.
Maybe Brenda is unable to answer the questions because her boss, the city administrator, will not let her.
Maybe what she is really saying is please stop by the fire department and sign the petition as she knows it is the only way we are going to get answers.
can not fix our streets. Granted we receive some free money from Big Daddy but we have to spend
some of our own money and we just do not have much of it. I am wondering what the new board
is thinking.
Is he happy that this will send a message that the city needs a state audit to get to the truth?
Just think about it he used to be a police officer and don't police officers think people they are questioning have something to hide when they don't respond.
Clearly the city is hiding something, therefore I too will be visiting the fire department to sign the petition.
So we are to have back in parking and that requires a removal of a driving lane each way? And some are worried that removal of the turn lane on Blue Ridge will slow down traffic? Just wait till some of our many geezers try the back in parking. Ha-ha
Nothing against geezers, mind you, I am one too. But many of us are challenged on our backing up skills.
BTW... I think Marilyn made the best comment of the week.
And if I may say.... I'm so glad the haters were able to save our downtown so we could blow hundreds of thousands on a "streetscape". Just more real money poured down a rathole of inefficiency. Then to add insult, the city must hire an outsider to manage this boondoggle.
Okay then. Have a Great Good Friday Raytowners. And a peaceful Easter.
RN
It recently occurred to me that Walmart seems to be the victim of a double standard. I don't recall all the moaning and groaning when stores like Hy-Vee and Price Chopper were busy putting so many local neighborhood markets out of business.
Sure hope the city gets busy on the 59th street sidewalk project. It needs to be ready for the next school year.
Regards Raytowners,
RN
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