Thursday, January 17, 2019
YOUNGSTOWN
Officials with the city, which faces the possibility of having to pay about $5.5 million from its general fund and go into fiscal emergency, said they came away from a meeting with state auditors hopeful that the matter will be resolved.
The city inappropriately spent that money from its water, wastewater and sanitation funds for economic-development projects, and was told in November by the state auditor’s office that it could be required to pay that back from its general fund.
Officials with the state auditor and the city met privately Wednesday to discuss Youngstown’s 2017 state audit, which involves the general-fund issue.
While city officials at the meeting declined to discuss specifics about it, several said they are optimistic the matter will be resolved without forcing the city into fiscal emergency.
“I’m much more relaxed after the meeting,” said Councilwoman Anita Davis, D-6th. “I’m feeling a lot better. If we do our job correctly, we’ll be able to navigate ourselves through what’s going on.”
Mayor Jamael Tito Brown, who also attended the meeting, said: “It was very productive. We’re still in discussions with the auditor’s office. It’s still open. We’re moving in the right direction.”
Also attending the meeting, Brown said, were Law Director Jeff Limbian; Assistant Law Director Dana Lantz; Council President DeMaine Kitchen; and Councilmen Mike Ray, D-4th, Nate Pinkard, D-3rd and Julius Oliver, D-1st.
“It was more of an awareness” meeting, Kitchen said. “It shed some light on where we are. We’re trusting the administration will present something to [city council] to move forward.”
Ray said: “We had a good discussion. We’ll see where we go from here.”
While the city has used close to $10 million primarily from its water and wastewater funds since 2010 for business development, it was the March 2018 settlement of a class-action lawsuit that questioned the legality of the process that drew the attention of the state auditor. But the state auditor’s office is only interested in the $5.5 million from water, wastewater and sanitation funds spent for those purposes since 2017.
The auditor’s office may require the city to pay back that money from its general fund. That fund ended 2018 with a surplus of about $100,000. If the city has to pay back even a small portion of the $5.5 million from its general fund, city officials say it would result in Youngstown having to declare fiscal emergency.