Northampton County Controller's office recently audited the county's P-Card program, which essentially is a county credit card issued to some employees for purchases. The report, prepared by Auditor Amna Ehsan and approved by Controller Tara Zrinski, was generally positive. All approved transactions had the required receipts. There is no evidence that anyone tried to circumvent the P-Card program. And no retired or resigning employees remained in possession of a card. The Controller did, however, raise a red flag about high dollar purchases (over $5,000).
Of 16 high dollar purchases (over $5,000), 15 lacked the required quotes. They were for legitimate purposes.
17 comments:
Who is responsible for signing off on the purchases? Why were the quotes not received? Who dropped the ball? This may not be a big deal, considering the purchases were legitimate, but how was it not known that buds (or whatever) were not received?
Something's rotten in Denmark!
The Zirinski Controller reign will never find any real problems with her patron McClures administration. He is her patron.
Seems like a lot of important information is missing from this article.
Well, at least they were for legitimate purposes, those $5000+ purchases without required quotes. I imagine it would be a different story if they were for illegitimate purposes without the required quotes. Or would would illegitimate purchases without required quotes have actually canceled out any negative findings in the audit? Hmmm...
No excuse, should have received quotes for $ 5000.00 or more
No details are offered here and resons for sole source justification which may be very valid. It is a contractors market with all the construction work, it is tough to get small contractors to bid on work. Currently, many have a backlog of commercial work. Sometimes public bids go unresponsive. Some grant programs target small and disadvantage business but have so much red tape, it is impossible or cost prohibitive for a small business to respond to public solicitation. Personally, I no longer bid of some state professional contracts after losing a bid by $200, full well knowing the winning bidder implementation provided more uncertainty and less resolution on the services being offered. Prevailing wage is also a deterrent for small business who find it makes them less competitive. Only government will waste $3,000 in time and energy to bid a $10,000 contract. On the government side of things, CDBG requirements disadvantage qualified, small business's and make it burdensome to bid. In some cases a small business would have to front too capital and then be bogged down by paperwork that makes the decide to not bid. Bonding requirements sometimes is foreign to small business. I think government procurement process could use reform and flexibility.
"Only government will waste $3,000 in time and energy to bid a $10,000 contract."
Agreed, but caveat...there are more considerations in public contracting than just cost. Simply put, the integrity of the procurement process has value, to the extent that it supposedly helps to insure the integrity of the procurement, and that no one is secretly greasing their hands.
I say this as a guy who has spent much of his career wrestling with the public procurement world.
Yes, make the Judges get quotes. It’s not like they’re doing anything else.
May have been emergency purchases
Proper receipts were not provided. Should not have been approved.
Rules are rules. If 3 calls were made and only 1 person returned a quote and the P-card was used for a purchase from that vendor, then the record should reflect the 3 calls made and the 1 response.
Why are these purchases bid?
Vote them both out.
10:17 am, you aren’t kidding. The county’s judicial system is one of the laziest I have seen. Everything seems to go to a plea deal, though who knows since little information is reported. And the drama seems unending. Just what has Baratta accomplished since January? Did he fulfill all of his promises?
Should have elected Cusick.
So what is the corrective action to ensure that it doesn't happen again?
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