12-2-2008
The IPT today carried a piece on a informal investigation by the AG's Office and the Canyon County Prosecutors office and have determined the Sheriff has not commited a crime with his use of a county credit card. No mention of the DSD employee use of the credit card for personal use was mentioned.
PA
If you read the Idaho Press Tribune today you know Top Copper for the county, Sheriff Chirs Smith and a DSD employee apparently used county credit cards for personal purchases. Clerk Auditor, Bill Hurst is calling for the County Prosecutor to look into this matter as is required by law. Mr. Hurst has turned his data and information over to Prosecutors Office for follow-up.
THE GUARDIAN did some further research, the following is taken directly from the Idaho Association of Counties Policy Manual on Managing Finances and Ethics..., page 8 of the manual reads....
"State Law:
Effective July 1, 2006, Idaho Code Section 18-5701 was amended to include use of a financial transaction card, financial transaction card account number or credit account for personal purposes or purposes other than a public purpose as a felony misuse of public money by officers. The definitions of these types of cards and accounts are found at Idaho Code Section 18-5703 and include credit cards, debit cards and telephone cards. The penalty for a conviction includes a possible prison sentence of not less than one year or more than ten years and the person is disqualified from holding public office in the future."
A read of the Idaho Code sections pertaining to this all hail back to misuse of credit cards by a former Mayor of Boise and other public officials and employees. Having one of these credit cards is a burden many officials don't want to put up with and simply don't have one.
THE GUARDIAN is calling for an outside audit of all Canyon County public credit card usage and expenses charged to these cards. If personal expenses charged to these cards is a problem, it will surface via an outside audit.
A public records request shows Canyon County has also been paying LATE CHARGES on county credit cards held by county employees. This is very troubling to find out taxpayers get stuck with credit card late payment fees.
It will be interesting to see how this plays out. Stay tuned for more.
Both the investigation and prosecution of these crimes should be carried out by the attorney general's office not by Dave Young. The public and the news paper should demand that this happen.
ReplyDeleteIdaho Press Tribune ran a wire service piece on the Twin Falls County Sheirff running up $20,000 in credit card debt. Commissioners are going to wait until after the first of the year to address this??? Outgoing Sheriff says he will more than likely have to pay the credit card debt off personally to get it all settled.
ReplyDeleteWhy doesn't someone ask Smith to produce evidence that he was on a State trip, the actual receipts and the travel agenda. If he has nothing to hide he would show these items to the press and those investigating the misuse of the credit card. This is why people hate politicians and politics. It's who you know and what others are willing to give you a free pass for, while Joe citizen goes to jail.
ReplyDeleteOpen door policy is getting to be such a cliché when you want the pubic-at-large to all contact a pubic figure individually. Open door policy should mean a policy of honesty, openness and taking information to the public in a public forum. Hard facts and evidence should be presented openly, in full and without reservation. Admitting errors is part of this process too. The public is so weary of off handed remarks, partial truths, oh well I didn’t mean it, kinds of attitudes they don’t trust anything government officials have to say.
ReplyDeleteOkay, I guess it alright to beat your wife if is just a little bit and you wouldn’t do it very often because you are either at work, with your friends at the bar, with your girl friend, or sleeping it off. I thought I read that it was closer to $40 nice rounding form the “bunch of idiots” post. I don’t think every in my life have I spend that much on one meal for myself unless a couple of drinks were involved. If it was sheriff business why didn’t Smith just have the county pay for it, even if the state was involved? Just isn’t adding up. Using public funds is like meth, not even once or a little bit.
ReplyDelete