RFP Staff
♦ Mayor Karen Alexander and the incumbent City Council continues to thwart public audit discussion. The Salisbury City Council will meet again on Tuesday January 19th, the second public meeting since the city made its audit public. The audit disclosed Fibrant is in violation of state law and that embezzlement occurred in the collections department due to improper procedure. These two audit findings were labeled significant deficiencies by the audit company Martin and Starnes.
Mayor Karen Alexander and Councilman Brian Miller made repeated attempts in the last two council meetings to guide discussion of the negative audit findings into private closed-door meetings not open to the public. Councilman Kenny Hardin insisted that the discussion be at a council meeting so the public can be included, but so far the city has refused to place the audit discussion on the agenda.
Since the audit was made public, Assistant City Manager John Sofley was removed from management of both Fibrant and the Collections department, the two areas of the city budget resulting in the negative audit findings.
The city has not responded to requests for public records that disclose the amount of money embezzled in the collections department.
City Council Agenda for January 19th 2016:
http://www.salisburync.gov/Departments/Administration/2015_Agendas/01-19-2016%20Agenda.pdf
