By Donna Porstner
Staff Writer
November 16, 2006
STAMFORD - One day after an audit revealed sloppy bookkeeping, excessive spending and possible fraud in the Glenbrook Fire Department, city officials announced plans to review the finances of the city's four other volunteer fire houses.
Officials decided to have the accounting firm that did a forensic audit of the Glenbrook department review financial controls at the Springdale, Belltown, Turn of River and Long Ridge fire departments during a meeting of the Board of Finance's Audit Committee yesterday.
Although the volunteer fire departments are separate nonprofit organizations, they receive city funding every year.
The audit, released Tuesday, found Glenbrook's former treasurer, David Judge, routinely wrote himself checks from the department's treasury, including $12,600 for stipends he was not entitled.
Judge could single-handedly approve expenditures because he had a signature stamp for department president Edward Rondano, the audit found, sidestepping a requirement for two signatures on checks.
Judge also purchased office supplies and other items using fire department funds and had them shipped to his home and business addresses, the audit found. The auditors said they could not ascertain whether the purchases benefited the fire department because they could not find invoices and other records.
The auditors recommended forwarding their findings to "local authorities," but city officials have been waiting for the fire department's board of trustees to respond before taking any action. The board has until Dec. 15.
Audit Committee Chairman Tim Abbazia favored waiting to hear the trustees' side of the story, but the committee's other member, Joseph Tarzia, said he planned to forward the results immediately to the state attorney general and the chief state's attorney's office.
"We have a public responsibility to the taxpayers to do that," he said.
Tarzia said Glenbrook officials had several chances to present their side, noting the auditors sent Judge several certified letters, to which he did not respond.
Office of Policy and Management Director Peter Privitera said Judge met with the auditors soon after they began their work in June and agreed to provide records they requested, but did not follow through and eventually stopped returning their phone calls.
"Meetings were set up, and no one showed up," Privitera said.
No one from the fire department was present at yesterday's meeting.
Contacted by telephone Tuesday, Judge told a reporter he could not comment on the audit because he had not read it.
Judge stepped down as treasurer in June. He was replaced by David McMahon of Stratford. Privitera said McMahon was "very cooperative, however, he did not have the documentation we needed."
Abbazia said the audit underscores the need to review the Glenbrook Fire Department's viability as a stand-alone entity.
"Maybe this isn't the best way for the fire service to be organized," Abbazia said. "We've been at odds with the volunteer fire service for years. We have been working as a city for years for them to be more efficient."
Director of Administration Ben Barnes said his first concern is ensuring Glenbrook's board of trustees has taken steps to implement new financial controls to prevent similar problems.
"That, to me, is the most urgent thing we need to have them do," Barnes said.
Finance Board members also decided they will require outside agencies funded by the city, which include the volunteer fire departments, to show audited financial statements when they make their budget requests in the spring to ensure their books are reviewed by independent experts.
Tarzia said the city erred by not requiring the Glenbrook Fire Department to show audited financial statements before handing over more than $1 million a year.
The auditors found Glenbrook had not done an annual audit, as required by its bylaws, since the mid-1990s.
"Maybe we could have prevented the problem eight years ago or 10 years ago, depending on how far it goes back," Tarzia said. ". . . If nobody tipped us off however many months ago, we'd still be going along merrily."
The Glenbrook audit began as a review of the department's financial controls after officials in city hall received an anonymous tip last winter from someone who said checks were bouncing and questioned some of the purchases made. Privitera said the review quickly snowballed into a forensic audit when officials learned there was a systemwide lack of controls.
Privitera estimated the four additional audits will cost the city $20,000 to $30,000, in addition to the $25,000 already spent in Glenbrook.
Copyright © 2006, Southern Connecticut Newspapers, Inc.