A.G. Gancarski
Jacksonville residents haven’t given the Clerk of Courts office much thought, except for when said office is concocting reasons not to perform same-sex marriage ceremonies. As a result, many of the structural problems the office has necessarily fly under the radar. Luckily, the City Council Auditor is tasked with looking at that office’s issues.
They are myriad, and include “incomplete and outdated policies and procedures for county functions, which were in the process of being updated at the time of our audit work; excessive access rights granted to the recording and tax deeds systems,” and “within the tax deeds area, a back-log and an opportunity for improvement with the process.”
The audit also spotlights an inability of the office to comply with previous audits.
“Additionally, in following up on findings from our prior audit of the Clerk of the Courts (#685), which was conducted of the prior Clerk Administration, we found multiple items related to expenses paid by both the City and the Clerk that have not been resolved. As a result there are two subfunds within the City that are owed a combined $2.5 million by the Clerk and the City’s General Fund.”
The audit also takes issue with a lack of a set of standard operating procedures, which leaves the office open to vulnerabilities when employees invariably move on.
Another issue: Access rights have run amok in the Clerk of Courts office, especially regarding tax deeds and the recording system.
“We noted various issues related to the level of access to the Clerk’s recording and tax deeds systems. Specifically, we found issues with users having access rights without a valid business purpose based on current assignment and other accounts with active access even though the employees associated with the account were no longer employed.”
Restricting access is recommended.
Cashiering and deposit processes likewise are sloppy, in a way that would get employees fired from the nearest McDonald’s. Drawers would be balanced the next day, allowing employees to “borrow” money and then return it the next day. As well, employees share the same cash drawer, which increases the risk for “theft and errors.”
Additionally, fees are often assessed by the office that have no actual basis in statute. The Council Auditor recommends that the practice cease.
The problems extend to basic accounting, also, such as subfund deposits.
“During our testing, we found that the Clerk’s Office appears to have deposited amounts into the incorrect subfund with the City. Of the 6-year period tested, we found 3 amounts totaling $106,010.84 that appear to have been deposited by the previous Clerk Administration into the General Fund/General Services District rather than the appropriate subfunds,” the Council Auditor wrote.
As well, there are 16-month delays in processing tax deed auctions, a burden that costs the city money in terms of interest.
These issues and others cost the city of Jacksonville serious money, as in seven figures.
Overall, we found that many of the monetary findings noted in the prior audit were never fully resolved by either the Clerk or the City. As a result, certain subfunds within the City remain in a negative cash position. One subfund in particular has had no activity since FY 2008/09 except for negative interest, which has annually ranged from $8,500 to over $200,000. This has resulted in the subfund going from approximately a $1.6 million negative cash position to a nearly $2 million negative cash position in the interim. In another subfund, the cash position is negatively impacted by the City and the Clerk’s Office not paying (or transferring over) a combined $0.5 million to the subfund. While the Clerk’s Office is partially responsible for some of the negative cash positions, the City’s General Fund/General Service District will have to cover the majority of the funding needed to fix these issues, which are estimated to total $2.5 million.
Similarly, there are two IT-related negative subfunds totaling $2.5 million.
The office has been slow to automate, continues the report, which leads to errors like this:
The Clerk’s Tax Deeds Office could be more efficient if the tracking of payments by tax deed applicants was more automated and secure. We noted during this audit that the application tracking process was similar to what we noted in the prior audit. One of the employees in the Tax Deeds Office was assigned the task of keeping track of numerous tax deed applicants and identifying whether they had remitted their application fees. This involved checking a hard copy file each day to see who had not paid.
Clerk of Courts Ronnie Fussell is the quintessential good ol’ boy politician, but he’s not the sharpest knife in the cutlery drawer, as evidenced by his reference to RPOF Chair Blaise Ingoglia as Blaise Mongolia at the Lenny Curry victory party in May. People like him in Jacksonville. However, this audit spotlights that, for all the good will Fussell has accumulated, there are some unresolved operational issues in his office.
