Transitional audit reveals former Sheriff Darr was over budget by $13 million

Former Sheriff John Darr was over budget by approximately $13 million before leaving office, and that doesn’t include the cost of legal expenses associated with his law suit against the city, a recent audit found.

John Redmond, the city’s internal auditor, shared the information at a Columbus Council meeting on Tuesday, while presenting the results from an audit conducted as the department transitioned to a new sheriff.

Redmond said transitional audits are a routine procedure undertaken by the city whenever there’s a change in departmental leadership. The audit of Darr’s budgetary performance began after Sheriff Donna Tompkins was elected to the position in the December run-off.

The audit covered Darr’s eight years in office. His budgeting was compared to that of his predecessor Ralph Johnson, who was $579,000 under budget during the last four and a half years of his eight-year tenure, according to the audit.

Darr, unlike Johnson, received $21.7 million from the OLOST between fiscal years 2010 and 2016, Redmond said.

“In 2008, the OLOST was adopted by the voters, it was predicated on the addition of 100 police officers and other enhancements to Public Safety, to provide better coverage of the city and to reduce crime,” according to the audit. “The increase in the number of police officers resulted in a much higher number of cases and arrests, which led to increase in courts. Corresponding expense increases are a natural outcome of this growth.”

Redmond said the county also is seeing more cases with multiple defendants, which requires more security in the courtroom.

The $13 million budget overage resulted in the reduction of 31.25 days of reserves in fund balance, Redmond told council. Legal fees and settlements accounted for additional days in the reduction of fund balance.

Over Darr’s eight-year tenure, his administration was significantly over budget in the following areas: $2.9 million for the Operations/Uniform Division; $3.4 million for jail detentions; and $3.8 million for medical expenses. About $2.1 million was attributable to the remaining business units. And unpaid obligations office-wide amounted to $800,000, according to the report.

Redmond said $3.145 million of medical over-spending occurred while the medical clinic operated in-house. Beginning in fiscal year 2014, clinic management was outsourced to a third-party vendor and medical expenses declined by $419,000 during the first year.

The Sheriff’s Office also will likely see a drop in costs resulting from the Rapid Resolution program, which has decreased the jail inmate population by 6 percent in 2015 and 7 percent in 2016, he said.

As for contracts, Redmond said the Sheriff’s Office purchases pharmaceuticals from Diamond Pharmacy Services, with expenditures exceeding $1 million a year. But no contract exists in departmental or Purchasing Division files.

The audit also reviewed bank accounts that Darr was allowed to establish as a constitutional officer. Redmond said one account for special events provided a vehicle for funding charitable causes such as Adopt-A-School, Project Lifesaver, Special Olympics and PAWS-Humane.

“Expenditures made from this account supported the aforementioned charitable causes,” according to the audit. “However, a portion of the expenditures appeared to be for operating and capital expenditures of the Sheriff’s office that should have been paid from appropriated budgetary funds and compliant with city procurement policies.”

The audit found a similar situation with a commissary account, which contains funds from the sale of goods and services to jail inmates. Redmond said the sales amount to about $30,000 a month.

“Primarily these fund are designed to be used for the benefit of the inmates; and some of it was used for those purposes,” he said. “But, again, some of it was used to buy things that were needed at the jail, sometimes of a capital nature, sometimes for supplies.”

At the end of the audit, Redmond made several recommendations to the current sheriff for improving the department’s finances. The first was to appoint/and or hire a financial manager to prepare budgets, as well as monitor and control expenses. Tompkins has complied by hiring Maj. Joe McCrea as the Major of Administrative Bureau, he said.

This story was originally published March 14, 2017 at 4:23 PM with the headline "Transitional audit reveals former Sheriff Darr was over budget by $13 million."