State auditor finds thousands lost to incompetence
Wyatt Buchanan, Chronicle Sacramento Bureau
Wednesday, January 19, 2011
An incompetent prison psychiatrist was kept on the state payroll at a cost to taxpayers of hundreds of thousands of dollars, while a state worker with a drinking problem stuffed confidential documents in her desk and took other papers home to avoid doing the work, according to a semi-annual report released by the California State Auditor on Tuesday.
The audit, the result of tips to a state whistle-blower hot line, found eight instances of what Auditor Elaine Howle called substantiated allegations of improper governmental activities. Instances of improper spending and incompetence by workers created costs of just over half a million dollars in the report.
"We feel that reporting on everything we discover and the results and so forth will serve as a deterrent to other employees so they won't engage in these activities," said Margarita Fernandez, spokeswoman for the auditor's office.
The highest dollar figure cited in the report is that of a psychiatrist overseeing parolees for the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. The psychiatrist - who is not identified by name or location - was accused of negligently underprescribing, overprescribing and inappropriately prescribing medications.
Those accusations were made in June 2006, and the psychiatrist was reassigned to an administrative job in October of that year. The internal investigation was not completed until two years later, and the psychiatrist was not terminated until May 2009.
All the while, the psychiatrist received a normal salary, along with two merit-based salary increases, and accrued 226 hours of leave worth more than $29,000 that was paid out when the psychiatrist left, according to the auditor.
"According to our calculations, the amount of salary (the corrections department) paid the psychiatrist during this period exceeded the value of the administrative duties he performed by $366,656," the audit states. During the period, the psychiatrist earned more than $600,000.
Terry Thornton, spokeswoman for the corrections department, said the situation was, "A very complex, resource-intensive situation and we completed it within three years as prescribed by law," adding that, "every investigation is different and I don't think you can just broad-brush them."
The auditor found that the department treated the investigation as a low priority, but Thornton challenged that assertion.
In addition to that situation, the auditor also highlighted a manager, again unnamed, at the Kern Valley State Prison who allowed an employee to take two-hour breaks at the end of a shift for more than three years, worth just under $24,000 of the worker's salary for that time.
Thornton said the matter was an issue of improper training, not misconduct, and the department did not discipline the employee or manager.
At the Victims Compensation and Government Claims Board, which oversees among other things compensation to victims of crime, the auditor found problems from 2004 to 2007 by an employee with a history of misconduct - including being found asleep in a restroom three times, probably because of a documented alcohol problem.
The employee removed 468 confidential documents from the workplace and stored them at her residence, and stuffed 788 pieces of unopened mail in her desk. A supervisor told the auditor that the worker removed the documents to avoid working on them.
That resulted in 23 applications for compensation not being processed and 27 invoices for medical and mental health bills worth more than $10,500 being paid late.
Jon Myers, spokesman for the claims board, said the system has completely changed since 2007 so that all files are now scanned and stored electronically. He said all the people affected were notified and the staffer was dismissed in October 2009, though Myers said he "can't comment on the nature of her dismissal."
Other instances noted by the auditor include an attempt by a worker at the California Conservation Corps to avoid bidding out contracts for uniforms by splitting one contract into several smaller pieces, a manager at the Department of General Resources who misused his state-issued vehicle to commute to work, theft of vehicle registration fees at the Department of Motor Vehicles and two Caltrans engineers who left work early to teach community college classes.
Anyone with a tip for the California State Auditor can call the whistle-blower hot line at (800) 952-5665.
E-mail Wyatt Buchanan at wbuchanan@sfchronicle.com.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/01/19/BAER1HB09Q.DTL
This article appeared on page C - 1 of the San Francisco Chronicle
Wednesday, January 19, 2011
An incompetent prison psychiatrist was kept on the state payroll at a cost to taxpayers of hundreds of thousands of dollars, while a state worker with a drinking problem stuffed confidential documents in her desk and took other papers home to avoid doing the work, according to a semi-annual report released by the California State Auditor on Tuesday.
The audit, the result of tips to a state whistle-blower hot line, found eight instances of what Auditor Elaine Howle called substantiated allegations of improper governmental activities. Instances of improper spending and incompetence by workers created costs of just over half a million dollars in the report.
"We feel that reporting on everything we discover and the results and so forth will serve as a deterrent to other employees so they won't engage in these activities," said Margarita Fernandez, spokeswoman for the auditor's office.
The highest dollar figure cited in the report is that of a psychiatrist overseeing parolees for the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. The psychiatrist - who is not identified by name or location - was accused of negligently underprescribing, overprescribing and inappropriately prescribing medications.
Those accusations were made in June 2006, and the psychiatrist was reassigned to an administrative job in October of that year. The internal investigation was not completed until two years later, and the psychiatrist was not terminated until May 2009.
All the while, the psychiatrist received a normal salary, along with two merit-based salary increases, and accrued 226 hours of leave worth more than $29,000 that was paid out when the psychiatrist left, according to the auditor.
"According to our calculations, the amount of salary (the corrections department) paid the psychiatrist during this period exceeded the value of the administrative duties he performed by $366,656," the audit states. During the period, the psychiatrist earned more than $600,000.
Terry Thornton, spokeswoman for the corrections department, said the situation was, "A very complex, resource-intensive situation and we completed it within three years as prescribed by law," adding that, "every investigation is different and I don't think you can just broad-brush them."
The auditor found that the department treated the investigation as a low priority, but Thornton challenged that assertion.
In addition to that situation, the auditor also highlighted a manager, again unnamed, at the Kern Valley State Prison who allowed an employee to take two-hour breaks at the end of a shift for more than three years, worth just under $24,000 of the worker's salary for that time.
Thornton said the matter was an issue of improper training, not misconduct, and the department did not discipline the employee or manager.
At the Victims Compensation and Government Claims Board, which oversees among other things compensation to victims of crime, the auditor found problems from 2004 to 2007 by an employee with a history of misconduct - including being found asleep in a restroom three times, probably because of a documented alcohol problem.
The employee removed 468 confidential documents from the workplace and stored them at her residence, and stuffed 788 pieces of unopened mail in her desk. A supervisor told the auditor that the worker removed the documents to avoid working on them.
That resulted in 23 applications for compensation not being processed and 27 invoices for medical and mental health bills worth more than $10,500 being paid late.
Jon Myers, spokesman for the claims board, said the system has completely changed since 2007 so that all files are now scanned and stored electronically. He said all the people affected were notified and the staffer was dismissed in October 2009, though Myers said he "can't comment on the nature of her dismissal."
Other instances noted by the auditor include an attempt by a worker at the California Conservation Corps to avoid bidding out contracts for uniforms by splitting one contract into several smaller pieces, a manager at the Department of General Resources who misused his state-issued vehicle to commute to work, theft of vehicle registration fees at the Department of Motor Vehicles and two Caltrans engineers who left work early to teach community college classes.
Anyone with a tip for the California State Auditor can call the whistle-blower hot line at (800) 952-5665.
E-mail Wyatt Buchanan at wbuchanan@sfchronicle.com.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/01/19/BAER1HB09Q.DTL
This article appeared on page C - 1 of the San Francisco Chronicle
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