State auditor: Carroll Township officials' pay hike against the rules

10/5/2017

OAK HARBOR, OHIO — Several Carroll Township officials were overpaid because the township’s former fiscal officer misstated budgets, State Auditor Dave Yost said Thursday.

Current trustees Rodney Biggert and Kenneth Gyde and former Trustee Donald St. Clair were each paid $7,304 more than they should have been over a two-year period, while former Fiscal Officer Jessica Brough was paid $6,268, according to the State Auditor’s office. In total, $28,180 is owed back to taxpayers.

“Taxpayers lost out on tens of thousands of dollars because this fiscal officer was in over her head,” Auditor Yost said. “The only way for these administrators to right this wrong is by returning all of the unearned dollars to the township.”

Trustee and fiscal officers’ pay is based on the size of the projected budget. Ms. Brough overstated the 2014 budget by $668,000, and did not certify the township’s budget in 2015, yet still gave herself and trustees a higher than allowed salary.

Auditors also found Ms. Brough did not do timely updates to the Uniform Accounting Network, delaying payroll disbursements by nearly a year. Auditors also could not find any time sheets from 2014, minutes for six meetings, or an appropriation result ion.

Contact Nolan Rosenkrans at nrosenkrans@theblade.com, 419-724-6086, or on Twitter @NolanRosenkrans.