HOT SPRINGS — Almost 100 community members turned out for Monday night's Hot Springs School District School Board meeting.
“It doesn't come as a big surprise. People are going to go home and digest this,” said Lenny Page, a parent of a student in the Hot Springs School District.
Watch to learn more about the special school board meeting:
They were all there to hear the findings of a recent audit into a school district employee.
“What you'll see tonight is that there are some issues that we do have to discuss as a group, and as a board, you're going to have to make a decision about how to go forward,” said Elizabeth Kaleva, the Hot Springs School District attorney.
The audit of the employee was conducted over the past year, and within that year, the audit found inconsistencies that went against the school district's policies.
“There is a lack of information that went regularly to the board to allow them to make decisions about whether or not certain expenditures were appropriate,” said Kaleva.
The findings showed the school board failed to review expenses the employee paid to themself.
These included credit card transactions, payroll advances, processing their own pay without review, preparing and depositing funds, submittal of automated clearing house direct deposit files, medical flex payments without going through the third party administrator and writing accounts payable checks “whenever”.
The total of all the misappropriated funds that were paid to the employee by themself was found to be $13,554.
“To be honest, it's unclear how long. We only went back for one year, but the one thing that is abundantly clear is this has been a practice for quite some time,” said Kaleva.
Public comment was not taken at the meeting as the board members received the report the same night, although board members did allow the community to provide input on how to advance.
For some parents, the audit’s results led to frustration.
“It turns me back to the WWE days of Jesse the Body Ventura, where I tell it how it is. It ticks me off a little bit. A lot. It ticks a lot of people off,” said Page.
The school board will be taking questions on the matter until Oct. 8 at midnight. A special school board meeting is planned for Oct. 15.
MTN has not named the employee as the matter remains under investigation.
