Community Corrections director criticized for bookkeeping

Jim O’Neal, WITZ AM/FM News Director contributed to this report

It was made clear to all who attended the Dubois County Corrections Department meeting last night that not all is settled financially in the department.

Dubois County Community Corrections Director J.P. Weisheit came under fire from the community corrections board for his bookkeeping practices.

During the meeting, board chair Superior Court Judge Mark McConnell pointed out that the expenditure reports were misleading due to the methods he was using to record the income and expense statements.

McConnell asked Weisheit to explain some discrepancies on the statements pointing out a blank line on the May 2014 statement.

Weisheit stated that he had an error in the accounting that he couldn’t find. He didn’t want to make a deposit until the error was accounted for so he deposited the checks in June and put the income in the June statement. A deposit was made to the tune of $48,410 in June without any notation of where the funds came from.

Income includes the payments from the grants the department receives as well as the payments the participants have to make to take part in the program.

McConnell pointed out that the statements should be appropriate for the months the income and expenses were accrued. “If it was collected from the offenders in May it should appear in the May report,” he said. “So, now, we are always off by half a month or whatever.”

McConnell went over the numbers the department is reporting. According to the reports from Weisheit, the May report shows the expenditures were about $82,000 and income was about $66,000; a $16,000 deficit. In June though, collections were about $140,000 and expenditures were $88,000; a surplus of about $52,000. The total year to date collections for the department is $1,081,000 and year to date expenses are $1,036,000; a surplus for the year of about $45,000.

“This is a problem we are having over and over again, the numbers are not quite right,” McConnell said. “It doesn’t give us any confidence in these numbers. We don’t know where we stand.”

Weisheit had planned on asking the corrections board to hire an additional case manager and move some part time officers to full time. With the current bookkeeping problems, McConnell was prompted to ask Weisheit, “How do we make a decision like that when we don’t know where we stand?”

McConnell and the board would not approve the hiring of the case manager or moving part time officers to full time until the numbers on the books are settled and the income is stabilized.

The end-of-year balance on the department’s books doesn’t mean the department is out of financial trouble. The numbers reflect a single one-time $200,000 grant from the Indiana Department of Corrections and an additional $26,000 performance bonus the department received for the 2013-14 fiscal year. Those funds are not guaranteed for the current fiscal year.

According to McConnell, even though the program was given an extra $157,000.00 from the Indiana Department of Corrections to add to the $400,000.00 they receive annually, it’s not enough.

McConnell explained the department will still fall about $20,000.00 short each month even with the new grant amount from the state.

“Those were temporary grants,” McConnell said. “Our total grant now is $557,000. Although our grant has increased, we are actually receiving less from the department of corrections than we did last year at the tune of about $20,000 a month.”

In response, the board discussed more stringent measures in collecting user fees for the program.

They also discussed cutting indigent money payouts to participants when they abuse the money by purchasing cigarettes and lottery tickets with the funds. Indigent funds are given to the program participants to help them with living expenses until they can find a job. The program participants are given $10 a day until they are able to find a job and receive their first paycheck.

When participants who are not employed walk into the corrections center with cigarettes, the board feels the money is not being spent responsibly and they should have more discretion on revoking those funds.

The funds given to the participants while they are looking for a job are deposited on a prepaid card.

McConnell and the board also rejected giving raises to the Corrections Center employees, even though the rest of the county employees have received raises. He says that the epartment simply cannot afford to give them.

We have to look at the raises and look at what we have and hopefully, they [employees] can understand that,” McConnell said. “At some point, we hope that we can give raises or we can look at a where we are at and maybe give something along the lines of a bonus as opposed to pay raises. We can’t compete with the rest of the county employees with the pay increases.”

McConnell pointed out that the county has the taxpayers to draw on while community corrections relies on the offender fees being paid and the state grants.

For now the department will concentrate on tightening up spending and accounting to have a better picture of its status. The board directed Weisheit to submit the financial statements to the board members monthly in the future.

“I think we have to have a surplus so that if our income were to drop off from time to time we would be able to survive that without going into the red,” he said. “We need to make sure our income exceeds our expenses before we go out on a limb with expenses in the future.”

The state board of accounts reviews the community corrections department budget annually.