Every meeting reveals more reason to reboot Edgewood…….
The last Town Commission meeting held several very revealing and deeply troubling issues which casually might be overlooked and perhaps missed for the deep ramifications and serious implications they revealed. During the report from departments portion of the meeting the Chief of Police brought up a public safety issue, that should have never been an issue, but what was revealed is a much more deeply involved breakdown of the Towns operations.
Please listen to the meeting and make your own determination about where this issue resides. The Chief begins his description and discussion at 1:05:30 in the meeting.
He describes the Town Police Department unable to purchase gasoline for the patrol cars because the WEX cards used for the purpose quit working. These cards quit working because the bill was not paid.
There is further discussion by the town manager (1:12:30)and Commissioner Brennan (1:18:55), then the finance manager (1:28:55) regarding this incident and another troubling revelation regarding use of Town Credit cards where the cards are not assigned to current employees and which have no tracking for purchases. This violates many standard accounting and security practices and likely has led to misuse.
The final chapter in this revelation is that the half dozen plus credit accounts used by Town employees haven’t been paid. Like the WEX card account the individual card accounts for former employees simply weren’t paid. Credit accounts when not paid accrue interest and penalties… What has this error cost the town and what was the money spent on over the time these cards were in use?
The Town Manager will take action to fix these problems, but what does this say about Town operations and internal controls? We deserve far better. Is this a reason the Town is so far behind on financial audits? What other financial messes are we going to find out about!
There is serious doubt in the language of the conversation from the meeting. Is the rosy picture of Town operations portrayed by the Town Manager perhaps not taken from the right angle to capture the whole picture?