{"id":2344,"date":"2012-01-17T15:43:02","date_gmt":"2012-01-17T20:43:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/?p=2344"},"modified":"2012-01-17T15:43:42","modified_gmt":"2012-01-17T20:43:42","slug":"ghost-auditor-still-haunts-kennett","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/?p=2344","title":{"rendered":"‘Ghost’ auditor still haunts Kennett"},"content":{"rendered":"

Old financial questions still remain unanswered in the township, prolonging the debate<\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/em>By P.J. D\u2019Annunzio<\/strong>, Staff Writer, KennettTimes.com <\/em><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>KENNETT\u2014It started months ago with the release of the township\u2019s 2009-2010 audit. It escalated when questions were raised concerning the authenticity of the audit. Finally, it grew into a wildfire when\u2014after months of petitioning and citizen inquiries to the township\u2014those questions remained unanswered.<\/p>\n

To this day, that fire continues to rage in the hearts and minds of Kennett Township\u2019s citizenry, who still accost the township\u2019s Board of Supervisors and Manager for concrete answers.<\/p>\n

Township Manager Lisa Moore stated that she has been pursing contacts within the Pennsylvania Department of Community and Economic Development to find a solution, but after repeated questioning from the residents in attendance at Monday night\u2019s BOS meeting, Chairman Michael Elling offered a solution: residents should follow up on the matter themselves.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s ridiculous, this is a township matter,\u201d Kennett Township resident Bill Hewton said, \u201cThis is three months old now, this whole situation\u2026have you tried our representatives to see if they can intercede for us or find someone to call us back?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t see that there\u2019s any pressing, urgent need to resolve it,\u201d Elling responded. \u201cIt\u2019s a dangling issue\u2014which always bothers me\u2014but there\u2019s no consequence for waiting another month or two that I can see.\u201d<\/p>\n

But the crowd\u2014many of whom are still aggravated over the township\u2019s inability to accommodate them\u2014disagreed with the Chairman. After a brief eruption from the audience, Lisa Moore agreed to contact Representative Chris Ross<\/p>\n

Then, a new revelation.<\/p>\n

Hewton, continuing his questioning, asked if the alleged auditor was registered in Pennsylvania, as required by state law.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt doesn\u2019t seem he was,\u201d Moore responded.<\/p>\n

The meeting room broke into a veritable Greek Choir, with more residents offering opinions and suggested courses of action on how to resolve this long-standing issue.<\/p>\n

\u201cObviously this guy is mysterious, the auditor,\u201d resident Joe Duffy said. \u201cThat casts a large shadow on the audit done by him\u2026my feeling is that there\u2019s no audit, so we need an audit. Whether the state is ever moved to respond or not the people should have a legitimate audit.\u201d<\/p>\n

More residents chimed in, continuing the drive for tangible solutions.<\/p>\n

\u201cLisa would you agree, since there seems to be a lot of confusion on this issue, to turn over all of your files and information on the auditor?\u201d resident Bill McLaughlin asked. \u201cLet me give you an example: you did mention that on the 1099 for the 2010 audit is still on your desk? Can we see the 1099s? How about the auditor\u2019s introduction letter or the summary of his services?\u201d<\/p>\n

Still, as the controversy continues to embroil the township, some feel that the issue is a wild goose chase.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy do we want to spend all this money to go back and rehash things when we don\u2019t have any indication that things are wrong,\u201d resident and CPA Tom Corcoran asked. \u201cI know what\u2019s normally done under these situations, it seems that the township did things at arm\u2019s length and thought they did have a qualified auditor doing the job.\u201d<\/p>\n

But the few that stood for the township could not silence the overwhelming voice of the critics.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe as a township engaged in a contract with this person and we contracted them to perform a specific duty,\u201d resident Margot Taylor said. \u201cThe compliance and the follow-through of that contract is what concerns me the most; when you engage somebody for their services\u2026when the person doesn\u2019t have a real P.O. Box, doesn\u2019t have a real name, isn\u2019t registered in either state, you start going \u2018whoa, what\u2019s this person about?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Despite the strong cry for a resolution, the situation shows no signs of deescalating. Kennett Township residents are determined to remain vigilant in pursuing the matter to the point of adequate closure, while newly elected Supervisor Scudder Stevens has vowed to work closely with the his peers to resolve the issue at hand.<\/p>\n

For more information on the history of the audit, visit: http:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/?p=1479<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Old financial questions still remain unanswered in the township, prolonging the debate \u00a0By P.J. D\u2019Annunzio, Staff Writer, KennettTimes.com KENNETT\u2014It started months ago with the release of the township\u2019s 2009-2010 audit. It escalated when questions were raised concerning the authenticity of the audit. Finally, it grew into a wildfire when\u2014after months of petitioning and citizen inquiries […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2346,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,4],"tags":[266,55,389],"class_list":["post-2344","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-featured","tag-audit","tag-kennett","tag-missing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2344","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2344"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2344\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2346"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2344"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2344"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2344"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}