Mowing arrangement for Mississippi County courthouse is criticized in findings

CHARLESTON, Mo. -- State auditors don't approve of the mowing arrangement for the Mississippi County Courthouse but it isn't likely to change.

According to the state auditor's report on the two-year period ending Dec. 31, 2007, County Clerk Junior DeLay was paid $5,200 per year for serving as groundskeeper for the courthouse.

The auditor listed this among its findings in the audit report as bids were not solicited for the job and compensation exceeded $5,000.

Presiding Commissioner Jim Blumenberg said commissioners have tried several other options for yard maintenance at the courthouse over the years since the new courthouse was built.

Commissioners first tried bidding out the job but got complaints on how the courthouse yard looked.

"You couldn't depend on the people who won the bid to take care of everything that needed to be taken care of -- getting the mowing done on time, taking care of the flower beds," Commissioner Martin Lucas recalled. "It was more than they bargained for." He said those who won the contracts would "do only what it takes to get their pay."

Commissioners also tried having the road and bridge personnel and prisoners from the Southeast Correctional Center maintain the yard as their work at the Oak Grove Cemetery had been satisfactory. "It turned out to be nothing but a mess," Lucas said.

Lucas said there was no discrimination in selecting DeLay for the job other than picking someone who really wanted to do the best job they could regardless of what they were being paid.

"The bottom line is we turned to someone who had a passion to make the yard look good," he said. "He takes pride in it. He does more than he gets paid for."

Lucas noted under DeLay's care, the courthouse yard has been named "Business Yard of the Month" several times.

"As far as I'm concerned it's going to stay like that," Blumenberg said of the arrangement with DeLay.

The audit report also criticized commissioners for paying DeLay $998 per year for serving as secretary for the Johnson Grass Board and $3,992 per year for serving as secretary for the road and bridge department.

Blumenberg said DeLay has been doing these jobs since before he was first elected to serve on the county commission.

He explained as these jobs only consist of a few hours per week at most, it is hard to find someone else to fill them. "We don't need someone 40 hours per week to do that," Blumenberg said.

Another finding listed in the audit report was that personnel at the Mississippi County Detention Center could not account for $2,860 collected from inmates between October 2006 and December 2006.

According to the audit report, "Internal controls over receipts are in vast need of improvement and numerous problems with inmate account balances were found, including failure to reconcile inmate monies received to deposits and amounts posted to the inmate system, lack of reconciliations of open items to the balance in the inmate account, and not depositing intact."

These conditions were noted in the previous audit, according to the report, but there has been little improvement.

Sheriff Keith Moore was reported as being out of the office working on a case when attempts were made to contact him for comment on audit findings related to his office.

A complete copy of the audit is available at http://www.auditor.mo.gov/press/2008-75.....