Questions remain even as MYCAP sets a new course

U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, and U.S. Rep. Tim Ryan of Niles, D-17th, met recently with representatives of the embattled Mahoning-Youngstown Community Action Partnership to review the Ohio Board of Education’s demand for $877,000 that the department contends was not spent according to the terms of the Summer Feeding and Child and Adult Feeding programs it administers. The money for the programs comes from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which is why the intercession of Brown and Ryan is being sought.

MYCAP officials insist the $877,000 was not misappropriated. Instead, says Jamael Tito Brown, chairman of the MYCAP board of directors, a lack of adequate record-keeping by the previous management team — it was led by Director Richard Roller — caused the department of education to seek a refund of the money. If the state and federal governments do not buy the poor record-keeping argument, it is conceivable that MYCAP would have to go out of business if full payment were demanded.

While MYCAP officials were encouraged by their meeting with Brown and Ryan, the fact remains that the agency will have to prove without a shadow of a doubt that the money was spent to feed Mahoning County’s children and young people who were eligible for the services.

We hope it can, because as MYCAP’s Brown says, the money is not available to be returned. In other words, it’s gone. If the agency is unable to persuade the state education department that the funds were used to provide nutritional meals, the question that will have to be answered is this: What happened to the $877,000 or whatever sum of money can’t be accounted for?

In late 2009, when the state was investigating MYCAP, the focus was on the misuse of funds, nepotism, conflict of interest and a number of other issues, including weatherization work done on then Director Roller’s house. He, along with others on the management team, have been fired.

Roller hired his brother, Jason, as food service manager, and two of his cousins and his daughter were also on the payroll, as were other close family members.

In an editorial last year, we asked how a public entity funded by the taxpayers could become an employment agency for members of one family. We also wondered if anyone on the board of directors was in any way complicit in what was taking place, especially with regard to Roller’s activities.

The $877,000 refund demand suggests that all the questions raised during the investigation have not been satisfactorily answered.

New executive director

This is no reflection on the new executive director, Marilyn J. McDaniel, and MYCAP’s new fiscal director, David N. Waggoner. They deserve the community’s full support as they work to restore the agency’s credibility and financial stability.

As a result of its investigation, the state declared MYCAP, which is a nonprofit agency that administers 11 programs in Mahoning County to help poor and disadvantaged people, to be in “high-risk” status as a result of the way it was being managed.

The designation meant that grant funds given to the agency were considered “vulnerable to fraud, waste and abuse.”

But as a result of an interim management team being brought in and changes made in the operation of the agency, the state has lifted the “high-risk” status.

That said, the refund claim by ODE is cause for concern.