A CLOSER LOOK AT COMMUNITY SWEAT EQUITY HOUSING CORP.: TOO QUIET GOLDEN AGE CENTER EXAMINED

Copyright 1998 Southeast Missourian

Concerns about a possible misuse of county funds by operators of a senior adult day care center led the Cape Girardeau County Sheriff's Department in 1996 to begin a month-long investigation into the center's activities.

Cape Girardeau County sheriff John Jordan confirmed that beginning in late March and continuing throughout April 1996 his department investigated the Golden Age Day Care Center at the request of presiding commissioner Gerald Jones.

The center was housed at different times in two Cape Girardeau properties owned by Community Sweat Equity Housing Corp. The CSEH president, Dr. Bernice Coar-Cobb, also acted as the administrator of Golden Age. The center's facilitator, Michael Sterling, was also the CSEH treasurer. And Sterling's mother, Helen Sterling, was employed as the center's programmer.

The concern was that while it was drawing county funds, the center was not doing what its grant application said it was supposed to be doing.

"It was almost like a scam," Jordan said. "It looked really screwy."

"Virtually nothing was going on," he said.

A surveillance camera was set up by the department in a vacant store across the street from where the center was located at 1304 Independence. The camera ran 24 hours a day beginning on March 29 and going through the end of April.

Lt. David James, the detective with the sheriff's department who spearheaded the investigation, said the videos show little activity at the center during first week of taping and less during the second week. The activity consisted of a few people entering and exiting the building, only a few of whom could be positively identified as senior citizens.

The activity picked up for two days -- April 9 and 10 -- and then stopped completely. There was no activity in or around the house for the rest of the month, James said.

Questions arise

Suspicions about the center did not begin in 1996 but dated back to 1995. In an Aug. 14, 1995, letter written to Dr. Shelba Branscum, then president of the Senior Citizens Services Fund board, Presiding Commissioner Gerald Jones expressing his initial concern about the grant to Golden Age.

Jones wrote: "It has come to our attention that there has been additional money allocated for a project called 'Golden Age Adult Day Care' that was not specified in your proposals for funding for 1995."

"It is the responsibility of the County Commission to approve all budget requests and to evaluate your recommendations for funding," Jones wrote.

Funding for the center, along with funding for four other projects, was approved by the SCSF board at its March 20 meeting. The minutes of the board meeting for that day record that board treasurer Billy Joe Thompson told the board that the five grants did not need to be presented to the commission for final approval since the money would come from a rollover from 1994 funding and not from 1995 tax money.

In his letter, Jones requested that a representative of the SCSF board meet with the commission to discuss allocations of funds. A week later Branscum appeared before the commission to discuss projects in the 1995 budget.

Branscum recalled the meeting but said she did not remember being questioned specifically about the Golden Age center. She said that the commission had questions about how all the funds were being used.

She also said that during a three-week period in 1995, she made two unannounced visits to the Golden Age Day Care Center, then located at 4 N. West End Blvd. At the time of her visits there was activity going on there, she said.

Theresa Maurer, the administrative assistant for the senior fund, also visited the center during the same three-week period, confirmed there was activity going on and confirmed that the program was in compliance with the grant at that time, Branscum said.

"We didn't see anything out of the ordinary," Branscum said, though she added that the program being run by Golden Age was not the best quality.

Lack of activity

While initially the reports indicated that activities were being held at the center, as time went on the activities were fewer. Even the people who were reportedly involved in providing the activities at the center were sometimes unaware of their supposed involvement.

In the grant application she submitted to the county in October 1995, Coar-Cobb, who taught in the College of Education at Southeast Missouri State University at the time, listed a number of people and groups from the university who would work as volunteers. Coar-Cobb named herself as one of the volunteers. She also listed Leigh Burch.

Coar-Cobb wrote: "Leigh Burch, nursing student, Southeast Missouri State University and Bernice Coar Cobb, Science Educator, Southeast Missouri State University, members of the Marva Collins Club and Delta Sigma Theta Sorority of the University, have committed to volunteer services at the center, per schedule, individual, and group expertise."

But when contacted, Burch said that she did not remember ever going to the center or volunteering time and had no recollection at all of making a commitment to work there. Coar-Cobb was one of Burch's teachers at the university during the fall of 1995 and the class -- General Studies 101, a course required of all entering freshmen -- did talk about community service and doing things within the community.

"I was pregnant at the time and having a difficult pregnancy," she said.

If she ever made a commitment, which she could not recall making, she said she never worked at the center in 1996.

In fact, the amount of activity at the center dropped after the move from West End Blvd. to the house at 1304 Independence in October.

Maurer, whose responsibility as the administrative assistant included monitoring the organizations that received SCSF money, said that she drove by the house on Independence every day and began to get concerned when she saw nothing going on at the center.

Early in 1996, Maurer began stopping by the house every day, Monday through Friday, for two weeks, stopping by at different times during the day.

"The door was locked, and nothing was going on," she said.

Maurer contacted Coar-Cobb because Coar-Cobb was also listed as the administrator for the Golden Age Club and was responsible for writing the grant application and turning in the vouchers to the county for payment.

Coar-Cobb indicated to Maurer that the weather had been bad, with ice and snow, and that people had not been getting out.

"A red flag went up," Maurer said. "On numerous unannounced visits nothing was going on."

Funding rescinded

Maurer reported her findings to the SCSF board in March, shortly after the center had submitted payment voucher for January and February. The voucher requested two monthly rent payments of $650 for January and February, payable to CSEH, and two payments of $250 to Helen Sterling for work as the center's programmer. The voucher was paid by the county on March 26, three days before the investigation by the sheriff's department began.

The SCSF board voted to rescind the funding to Golden Age and sent a letter to Coar-Cobb early in April explaining their decision. The letter -- from Dale Rauh, who became president of the SCSF board when Branscum resigned in January 1996 -- explained to Coar-Cobb the board's decision for discontinuing the funding.

"Circumstances prompting the Board's decision include the lack of program activity observed by the Board; the lack of signage indicating a program is in existence; and the 'for sale' sign on the property housing the day care," the letter said.

In the videotape made in the sheriff's investigation, Sterling can be seen on April 8 putting up a "Golden Age Day Care Center" sign on the house. But according to vouchers Coar-Cobb submitted to the county, the house had been used as the center since the previous October.

"The Board regrets this action but is charged to assure effective use of county monies," Rauh also said in the letter. "Since approved county tax funds were designated for rent and program administration, the Day Care's demonstrated lack of activity has precipitated the Board's decision."

Soon thereafter, no activity at all was seen in or around the house.

The SCSF board sent one further letter to Coar-Cobb rejecting a request Coar-Cobb had made to the board for additional funding for the center. In her request, Coar-Cobb stated that the purpose of the request was to satisfy rental obligations of the Golden Age center to CSEH for March 1 to April 12.

On July 30, 1996, Rauh responded: "The grant approved was for rental of a house for an adult day care program which was to be active five hours a day, five days a week. Because lack of full program acitivity prompted the board's decision to discontinue funding on the grant, the position of the board remains the same regarding dispensation of the county tax monies."

No charges were ever filed as a result of the sheriff's investigation because soon after the surveillance began, the Golden Age Club stopped submitted vouchers to the county. The last voucher submitted asked for funding only through April 12, about the time the tapes show no activity at all at the house on Independence.

NEXT: The future of CSEH Corp.