Friday, July 19, 2013

Miami has problems with juggling

Comment Up

You know we are always wondering where money goes. It is transferred out of this line item and put in another. The commission will make this or that resolution to justify it all. It's all tricky stuff and no one can remember months later where in hell the money went.  Commissions change just like city employees. Records are not detailed, are purged, or just plain inaccurate or go missing and we never know what is going on behind closed doors. Not anymore we don't.

Lake Worth got in the hot seat with FEMA and now Miami is in the hot seat for the second time with the SEC. The investigation in Miami, which began in 2009, stemmed from a Herald report that found city financial managers had transferred $26.4 million from the capital budget that pays for big-ticket construction items into the general fund to reduce gaping holes in the operating budget as the local economy soured. At the time, budget officials justified the transfers by saying the projects were no longer necessary.  This sounds vaguely familiar.

We had a lot of missing money in Lake Worth and our beach fund virtually disappeared years back. At least we can say here in Lake Worth that we now have confidence in our finance department since Steve Carr was hired but there are still some who complain about the Casino Finance Plan or question as to where the billboard money went. Miami can't claim that they have a stable finance department. One up on them. I think.

Read more... about Miami's problems with the SEC.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Sounds like Lake Worth to me.