At issue was a $4,000 transfer to her own account in 2016 from the non-profit National Equity Project, for which she controlled the accounting department. Felony charges weren\u2019t filed until 2019 after Cheers (Brown) reportedly attempted to take out a loan in the name of another company she worked for, BWML & Partners.<\/p>\n
That public relations firm also discovered she had paid herself several bonuses and made unauthorized credit card purchases, including a $10,000 vacation to a vineyard, according to CBS News<\/a>, which cited prosecutors in the case.<\/p>\n Cheers was originally charged with six felonies \u2014 grand theft by embezzlement, three counts of forgery, two counts of identity theft and one count of preparing false documentary evidence \u2014 but the plea included just one count of felony grand theft by embezzlement.<\/p>\n In Florida, several people involved in campaigns have raised suspicions that Brown had also stolen money from their client candidates. Most would not go on the record, but one, Jamie Jodoin, said she suspects Brown stole more than $30,000 from one of her clients, from the Fort Lauderdale Forever<\/a> political committee. Jodoin was appointed treasurer of the committee after suspicions arose and Brown was removed.<\/p>\n Brown was appointed Treasurer of the committee in July 2024, according to committee records, then removed at the end of 2025 after committee officers became suspicious of missing funds. During her time as Treasurer, the committee received at least three notices of late filed or unfiled Treasurer\u2019s reports \u2014 notice of a fine on Aug. 2, 2024; notice of accruing fines on Nov. 4, 2024; and notification of a late report without a fine on Mar. 12, 2025.<\/p>\n Jodoin said her client received a letter after inquiring about funds that appeared to be missing from an attorney hired at the D&D Law PLLC firm in Sunrise. The letter, according to Jodoin, explained that someone who worked for Brown had stolen funds and that they would be returned. To date, the funds have not been returned.<\/p>\n Jodoin said she became aware of potential missing funds in late 2025. She said she and her client are in the process of contacting the Broward County Sheriff\u2019s Office and the FBI about the theft after Brown stopped responding to inquiries about the funds.<\/p>\n It\u2019s worth noting that, typically, political committee treasurers are the ones who handle bank account activity, meaning a candidate or other campaign staff may only see campaign reports prepared by the treasurer and that such reports may not necessarily reflect actual bank balances.<\/p>\n In the case of the Fort Lauderdale Forever committee, by the time eyebrows were raised, the account had been shuttered, making it difficult to identify any impropriety.<\/p>\n A call to Brown\u2019s attorney was not immediately returned. Efforts to reach Brown at contact information listed in public documents have also been unsuccessful. But Jodoin is offering words of caution to other consultants who may have found themselves victims of theft.<\/p>\n \u201cThis has happened in the past. We\u2019ve been told this has happened in the past and prior candidates or committees didn\u2019t come forward because of political ramifications. If they had, we wouldn\u2019t be here right now,\u201d she said, referring to Brown\u2019s potential activities.<\/p>\n But wait, there\u2019s more<\/p>\n Brown received a letter on Nov. 6, 2023, from the Federal Election Commission informing her of a negotiated settlement<\/a> regarding a compliance failure in which the PAC, for which Brown served as treasurer, failed to disclose<\/a> all financial activity on its October quarterly report in 2022. The PAC was fined $3,200.<\/p>\n In late 2023, Jennifer Blohm, an attorney representing the Florida Policyholders Cooperative<\/a> political committee, received a letter from the Florida Elections Commission setting a hearing for Blohm\u2019s appeal, filed in March 2023, to a series of late-filed Treasurer\u2019s reports that had accrued $2,500 in fines.<\/p>\n Brown was not listed as the committee\u2019s treasurer; Jason Blank was, and remains, the treasurer. But the appeal states that Blank \u201chired Yolanda Brown of Brown Financial Consulting Services Group LLC to assist him with filing the campaign reports.\u201d<\/p>\n Brown, the appeal asserted, filed a timely waiver, but wrongly filed another report including financial activity that had already been filed in a previous report, thus creating a duplication and prompting a fine. The fine was ultimately waived.<\/p>\n Additionally, while there is no direct evidence of impropriety, Brown also collected from the Florida Democratic Party more than $12,000 from Mar. 13, 2020, through Mar. 1, 2021 \u2014 so less than one year \u2014 for office supplies, a high number compared to other office supply expenses.<\/p>\n For context, throughout the 2024 election cycle, spanning Jan. 26, 2023, through Jan. 22, 2024, not a single payout from the Florida Democratic Party listed with a purpose of \u201coffice supplies,\u201d \u201coffice supply,\u201d \u201coffice equipment\u201d or \u201coffice water\u201d exceeded $1,000, and the total for the entire period was just $2,348.<\/p>\n Brown was also the treasurer for Andrew Gillum\u2019s 2018 gubernatorial campaign, when he infamously left $3 million in the bank in what ended up being a razor-thin defeat.<\/p>\n It also appears Brown has had her own personal financial troubles. Brown, in 2019, filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in Minnesota, according to files available through LexisNexis.<\/p>\n The background<\/p>\n Brown\u2019s questionable activities as a Treasurer for various candidates, campaigns and political committees came into view this week as fourth-quarter financial reports were due. The report for the committee supporting Welch\u2019s eventual re-election bid (he has not yet filed for re-election, but has said he intends to run) showed $207,500 in \u201cunauthorized\u201d expenditures to a company Brown controls.<\/p>\n Adrienne Bogen, an advisor to Welch\u2019s political operation, directly accused Brown of theft and said efforts were underway to speak with state and federal law enforcement on next steps.<\/p>\n But it wasn\u2019t the first time Brown\u2019s leadership over committee finance created a problem.<\/p>\n Brown also served on the committee established to support Welch\u2019s first mayoral run in 2021, Pelican PAC<\/a>, which the state revoked<\/a> in 2024, citing various failures to report or timely report financial activity, and failing to file other disclosures such as appointing a new Treasurer.<\/p>\n The committee was established in 2019, but Brown did not become affiliated with it until October 2024.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Yolanda Brown, the former Treasurer for St. Petersburg Mayor Ken Welch\u2019s Pelican Political Action Committee accused of stealing…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":118338,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[58432,59493,59494,59495,59496,59497,2346,56421,58435,202,204,203,199,201,200,3525,59498],"class_list":["post-118337","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-st-petersburg","tag-adrienne-bogen","tag-andrew-gillum","tag-florida-policyholders-cooperative","tag-jamie-jodoin","tag-jason-blank","tag-jennifer-blohm","tag-ken-welch","tag-pelican-pac","tag-pelican-political-action-committee","tag-st-pete","tag-st-pete-headlines","tag-st-pete-news","tag-st-petersburg","tag-st-petersburg-headlines","tag-st-petersburg-news","tag-yolanda-brown","tag-yolanda-cheers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118337","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=118337"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118337\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/118338"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=118337"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=118337"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=118337"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/Florida_Politics_and_Influence_Magazine_728x90.jpg\")
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\nOther possible Florida impacts<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/CFPA-Digital-Ad-Sunburn-728x90-1.jpg\")
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