City manager will meet mayor to discuss 450th audit

After a long evening where the discussion was placed last on the items of business in the agenda, at about 9:30 p.m., City Manager John Regan offered to break a looming deadlock over terms for auditing contracts related to the 450th Commemoration.

About an hour of public comments were heard by members of the St Augustine City Commission; almost all, more than a dozen, raised concerns over the handling of contracts, purchase orders, or private contract work done in the name of the 450th over the past four or five years.

Historic City News obtained financial reports detailing spending of more than $3.5 million dollars on salaries, benefits, a management contract, as well as several events that the public regards as inconsequential — when compared to the core city services that were deferred, delayed, or abandoned while the city was in “party planner” mode.

At the last commission meeting two weeks ago, the meeting degenerated into a shouting match and hurt feelings when Mayor Nancy Shaver suggested that only an audit of the processes that have been employed in handling contracts for the 450th would prevent further embarrassment of the current commission. Commissioner Leanna Freeman stormed out of the meeting.

Tonight, the mayor apologized for implying that the other members of the commission were embarrassed by how the much maligned commemoration has been managed.

• The mayor laid out her concerns and a more detailed “ask” of what she felt was necessary to “clear the air” relating to the 450th bidding, procurement, and post-contract compliance auditing.
• Commissioner Nancy Sikes-Kline was the first to speak. She didn’t offer any motion, only to say that she acknowledged the resounding public call for an audit and that she was open to hearing more about what, exactly, the mayor wanted to accomplish.
• Commissioner Todd Neville, a certified public accountant by profession, said he was willing to go along with an audit of three or four contracts, but not beyond that; unless some material compliance issues were uncovered. “I’m not okay with auditing 100%,” Neville insisted.
• Vice Mayor Roxanne Horvath seconded a motion by Neville that the scope be limited, claiming that the city “has been nothing but transparent” in regard to the 450th, which drew loud laughs from the audience.
• Commissioner Freeman pressed the mayor to reveal the identities of three contracts that she said were discovered in the mayor’s own investigation of the matter. Shaver would not, and refused to do so when Neville made the same demand; explaining that she was asking for a comprehensive outside audit because of what she found and it was not necessary to disclose that information at this time.

Guidance from City Attorney Isabelle Lopez attempted to put some better limits on what, exactly, was to be reviewed — including a suggestion to create a spreadsheet of the approximately 80-100 contracts that have existed. Lopez proposed columns of data to include who each contract was given to, how much money was paid, what work was done, if the work was completed, and if the contract was “sole sourced”, a controversial purchasing practice by the city where sealed bids, or limited research, if any, is done to identify competing suppliers.

The commission appeared to be hitting all around a solution that could be approved, but they weren’t there yet. That is when Regan said that he will be the first to come forward to the commission with a cost estimate for outside auditors if he discovers irregularities worthy of further investigation.

In the interim, he proposed a beginning point where he will meet with the mayor, one-on-one, to talk about specific concerns she has found with management of the 450th process to date. From that, the mayor hopes that the city manager will agree that he shouldn’t be proud of how 450th contracts have been handled, despite well documented policies and procedures in place and applied to other General Services contracts.

Upon completion of those discussions, it is presumed that either a staff report from the city manager or mayor will be presented to the full commission for a recommendation on the appropriate scope of any audit that may be indicated.