Harrington Claims No Knowledge Of Any

Wrongdoing By HMDA

by Brenda Box

Former Deputy Mayor and current acting chairman of the Huntington Municipal Development Authority (HMDA), David Harrington, said that as far as he knew, the HMDA has done nothing wrong.

Harrington also admitted that he has yet to see the Huntington Audit Report, delivered to the city last Saturday by Lisa Thornbug, the Deputy State Auditor.

In that report, under the heading “Municipality Of Huntington, West Virginia Schedule Of Findings And Questioned Costs For The Fiscal Year Ended June 30, 2000”, Section II – Financial Statement Findings, Improper Disbursements, 2000-8, it reads as follows.

“CONDITION:  It was noted during this examination that the Huntington Municipal Development Authority expended monies without proper supporting documentation (specifically invoices), and issued checks with only one signature.

“CRITERIA:  Adequate control over disbursements includes requiring proper supporting documentation as well as two or more signatures on checks.

“CAUSE:  The Huntington Municipal Development Authority does not require two or more signatures on checks and does not have adequate procedures in place which would insure proper documentation and retention of invoices.

“EFFECT:  Disbursements are being made without verifiable evidence, such as invoices, and inadequate control of checks being issued.

“RECCOMMENDATION:  The Municipality should implement procedures requiring two or more signatures on checks and disbursements be supported by proper invoices.

“AUDITED AGENCY’S RESPONSE:  The city will monitor this situation”.

Harrington said whenever he signed a check, there was always another signature.

“My understanding was that there were always two signatures on a check,” Harrington told HNN.  “There are at least four people that can sign checks.  Anytime I’ve ever signed a check, there has always been another signature.”

Harrington said that the bookkeeper would be in charge of making sure checks had two signatures.

“Typically the bookkeeper would check the documentation on that,” Harrington said.  “That’s usually how it works.”

Mayor David Felinton said the city would do what it had to do to correct the HMDA’s alleged problems.

“It will come to council,” Felinton told HNN.  “We’ve already made some changes with new appointments and so on.   There are some good people on the HMDA.   We’ll be working to make it easier to audit in the future.”

Harrington said every check that he could remember that he signed had two signatures, yet the audit report said there were HMDA checks passed with only one signature.  However, the audit report goes on to say that the HMDA doesn’t have to have more than one signature, only that in order to have adequate control over disbursements, the organization needs to have more than one signature per check, as well as supporting documentation.

The audit report did not say whether anything the HMDA was doing was illegal, however it did criticize the operations of the organization.

“It appears to me that the auditor has taken liberties, almost editorializing, with some of the audit report,” Harrington said.  “Don’t get me wrong, I haven’t seen the audit, only what I’ve read on the internet.”

Harrington said that the State Auditor’s should have been more distinct.

“There needs to be a distinction between the audit and management advising,” Harrington said.  “It should be separate and apart from the audit document.”

Investigations into the HMDA will be released with the audit exit interviews in April, as well as several other municipal organizations.

“We did our best to serve the citizens of Huntington,” Harrington said.  “We did what we thought was right.”