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Brookfield district owed $277
By Ed Runyan
BROOKFIELD
The Ohio Auditor’s Office has issued a finding of recovery to the Brookfield Local School District for $277 that former transportation director Frank H. Baker still owes the district for scrap items he improperly took from the district and sold in 2010.
Baker repaid $430 of the $707 he received from the scrap, the auditor’s office said.
The Brookfield school district learned of the improperly taken scrap items, metals and an inoperable 1979 Ford station wagon in July 2010, the auditor’s office said.
Baker resigned from Brookfield Schools on Nov. 16, 2010, the audit says.
The audit, which was for the 2010 calendar year, says Brookfield schools responded that the district primarily was focused on “protecting the remaining assets available to Mr. Baker and the employment/dismissal of his service with the district.”
The district added that, “Once again, the district will renew its attempts at recovering the additional funds from Mr. Baker, and the auditor’s opinion will only strengthen the district’s case for collection.”
Baker, 44, of Erie Street, Masury, was hired by Brookfield schools as transportation supervisor in July 2007, just after he had been fired by Warren City Schools for stealing brake drums valued at $150 from the district bus garage, where he worked as a mechanic.
Baker pleaded no contest to misdemeanor theft in October 2007 in Warren Municipal Court in the Warren incident, receiving a suspended 180-day jail term, $250 fine and five years’ probation.
Baker was arrested on the Warren criminal charges in July 2007, just after he was hired in Brookfield.
Joe Pasquerilla, then-board president in Brookfield, said he and others who conducted interviews did not know about Baker’s pending arrest but were aware of the reasons Baker had been fired from Warren.
The state audit also said the district failed to provide an adequate system of internal control, meaning it failed to provide reasonable assurance that it is reliably reporting financial information.
The audit found that the district failed to identify a transaction of $312,831 in the building fund as a contract-payable amount.
“We recommend the district improve its control procedure to ensure all invoices dated prior to the end of the year are included as payables in the district financial statements,” the auditor’s office said.
The district agreed that it would implement an additional level of oversight, the audit said.
Multiple attempts Thursday to reach Treasurer David Drawl and Superintendent Tim Saxton were unsuccessful.
The district has been in fiscal watch since March 2006.