audit made headlines<\/a>.<\/p>\n\u201cI\u2019m sure this is just the beginning of the process to try to determine fault and also to consider best practices and keep this from happening again,\u201d Mayor Dean Trantalis said Wednesday. \u201cSuspensions alone are not going to correct the culture. The fact that this happened is unfortunate. There needs to be greater safeguards taken as we go forward.\u201d<\/p>\n
The three managers were neither faulted by the audit nor accused of engaging in abuse of the credit cards, known as P-cards. But as higher-ups in charge of watching over spending, they were held accountable by City Manager Rickelle Williams.<\/p>\n
Rufus James, director of the Fort Lauderdale Executive Airport, was given a three-day suspension, according to a June 16 memo signed by Williams.<\/p>\n
Carlton Harrison, assistant director of the Fort Lauderdale Executive Airport, was also given a three-day suspension.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn the report provided by the City Auditor, numerous incidents of improper use of a City P-card were cited involving staff at the Fort Lauderdale Executive Airport,\u201d Williams wrote in her email to James. \u201cAs the Director of the department, you are responsible for approving and overseeing the use of P-cards within your department.\u201d<\/p>\n
Williams wrote a similar email to Harrison: \u201cAs the assistant director and a P-card holder, you have the responsibility to properly use, approve, and oversee the use of P-cards within your department.\u201d<\/p>\n
Finance Director Linda Short was issued a two-day unpaid suspension.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs the director of the department, you have the responsibility to oversee the use and administration of P-Cards citywide,\u201d Williams wrote in an email notifying Short of the disciplinary action.<\/p>\n
The South Florida Sun Sentinel reached out on Wednesday to James, Harrison and Short by phone and email. None could be reached for comment.<\/p>\n
The audit reviewed activity from October 2023 to December 2024 but does not name the employees involved.<\/p>\n
City Auditor Patrick Reilly presented the audit\u2019s findings to the commission on May 19.<\/p>\n
One credit card, known as a P-card, was used to purchase $10,250 in Florida Panthers hockey tickets along with catered food and event parking.<\/p>\n
The purchases were gifts for certain airport tenants as a show of appreciation but should have been caught and questioned, the audit report says. Instead, they went undetected.<\/p>\n
The following two purchases were also flagged by the audit: $3,100 in gifts to certain airport lessees as travel-related expenses to attend a Las Vegas conference for marketing purposes; and $1,800 in leather luggage purchased as gifts for members of the city\u2019s Airport Advisory Board.<\/p>\n
In another case, a third party racked up $20,000 in charges after an employee failed to report a compromised credit card. The expenditures stopped only after being discovered and reported by the audit, according to Reilly\u2019s report.<\/p>\n
Other prohibited purchases listed in the report include: $180,000 of vehicle repairs and modifications; $55,000 of food transactions that exceeded allowable limits; $30,000 of non-travel items purchased with travel cards; $30,000 of telephone\/telecommunications expenses; $3,500 for a duplicate payment; $1,500 of retirement gifts in excess of allowable limits; and $1,500 for a computer purchased without pre-approval by Information Technology Services.<\/p>\n
Commissioner Steve Glassman said he was not aware of the suspensions until getting a call from a Sun Sentinel reporter.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is the first I\u2019ve heard of it,\u201d he said Wednesday.<\/p>\n
Glassman declined to say whether the suspensions were fair or not harsh enough.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s up to the city manager,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Trantalis said the city manager informed him of the suspensions on Wednesday afternoon.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe responsibility for management of the city and any disciplinary action deemed necessary is within the purview of the city manager,\u201d he said. \u201cI would defer to her judgment. If she felt it was necessary to suspend or dismiss anyone, I would defer to her judgment in this case.\u201d<\/p>\n
Vice Mayor Ben Sorensen said he backed the city manager\u2019s decision on how to discipline the employees.<\/p>\n
\u201cI trust the city manager\u2019s determination on penalties,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s the city manager\u2019s job to hire, fire and discipline employees. She makes hundreds of those decisions every day.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sorensen suggested the city might want to look into getting rid of its P-card program if it exposes the city to misuse.<\/p>\n
The credit cards\u00a0help streamline government small-dollar purchases by allowing authorized employees to pay for approved business purchases and travel expenses directly. Personal purchases are strictly prohibited.<\/p>\n
At a recent June 16 commission meeting, Sorensen asked the city manager what she was doing to improve the P-card program.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe said she was going to deactivate 25% percent of all P-card holders and also suspend individuals who were not providing the proper oversight or inappropriately using the cards,\u201d he told the Sun Sentinel.<\/p>\n
Sorensen said he was taking a wait-and-see approach on whether the new strategy changes the culture.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe will provide feedback to the city manager if we need to do more,\u201d he said. \u201cIf people can\u2019t use it appropriately, maybe the P-card program is something we shouldn\u2019t have.\u201d<\/p>\n
In a memo dated June 4, Williams informed the commission that James planned to retire as airport director on Aug. 10.<\/p>\n
On July 6, Assistant City Manager Ben Rogers would take over as interim director of the Fort Lauderdale Executive Airport.<\/p>\n
From that point forward, Rogers would be the new primary point of contact and provide day-to-day oversight of the department.<\/p>\n
\u201cA long-term leadership strategy will be developed and implemented at a later date,\u201d Williams said in her memo.<\/p>\n
Susannah Bryan can be reached at sbryan@sunsentinel.com. Follow me on X @Susannah_Bryan<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A scathing internal audit that uncovered questionable purchases made by Fort Lauderdale employees using city-issued credit cards has…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":302509,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[506,28,249,251,250,114,266,109],"class_list":["post-318610","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fort-lauderdale","tag-broward-county","tag-florida","tag-fort-lauderdale","tag-fort-lauderdale-headlines","tag-fort-lauderdale-news","tag-latest-headlines","tag-local-news","tag-social"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/318610","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=318610"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/318610\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/302509"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=318610"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=318610"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=318610"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}