{"id":76340,"date":"2025-12-09T01:05:12","date_gmt":"2025-12-09T01:05:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/76340\/"},"modified":"2025-12-09T01:05:12","modified_gmt":"2025-12-09T01:05:12","slug":"state-committee-approves-audit-of-daytona-beach-spending","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/76340\/","title":{"rendered":"State committee approves audit of Daytona Beach spending"},"content":{"rendered":"

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. \u2014 Members of the Florida\u00a0Legislature\u2019s Joint Legislative Auditing Committee approved an audit of spending in Daytona Beach Monday.<\/p>\n

The decision comes after, among other things, a recent car allowance audit<\/a> that found the city was spending more than $300,000 a year for 85 employees’ vehicles \u2014 even though some didn’t use their vehicles for city business.<\/p>\n

What You Need To Know<\/p>\n

Members of the Florida\u00a0Legislature\u2019s Joint Legislative Auditing Committee approved an audit of spending in Daytona Beach
\n
State Sen. Tom Wright requested the audit after concerns about\u00a0potential misuse and mismanagement of purchasing cards, to vehicle purchases
\n
A broadcast of the meeting can be found on The Florida Channel’s website<\/a><\/p>\n

State Sen. Tom Wright<\/a> also sent a letter in late November calling for state leaders to consider auditing Daytona Beach<\/a>.<\/p>\n

He wrote a letter where he argued that, in order to protect taxpayer confidence, he believes an audit is necessary.<\/p>\n

Wright’s letter highlighted a number of issues he wants to see addressed, ranging from the potential misuse and mismanagement of purchasing cards, to vehicle purchases and surpluses in building permit revenues.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese issues strongly suggest systemic deficiencies in Daytona Beach\u2019s fiscal oversight and internal accountability,” he said. “JLAC initiating an audit would provide clarity, determine whether state law has been followed, and help ensure that public resources are being managed responsibly and transparently.”<\/p>\n

Details of the future audit were not immediately available.<\/p>\n

Daytona Beach City Commissioner Stacy Cantu says she’s glad the state appears to be taking action, and took aim at an internal employee committee, or DOGE committee, City Manager Deric Feacher established in November for oversight<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel like this really needs to happen. Our residents want answers and for accountability and transparency, I think this is a good move,\u201d Cantu said.\u00a0\u201cHow do you DOGE yourself and this P-Card spending? Some of these people have P-Cards, you just can\u2019t DOGE yourself.”<\/p>\n

Following the committee’s decision, the city of Daytona Beach released the following statement from Feacher:<\/p>\n

\u201cAs City Manager, I take our responsibility to be good stewards of taxpayer dollars very seriously. The City of Daytona Beach welcomes the state\u2019s Auditor General to conduct an operational audit of our city. JLAC\u2019s unanimous decision to support Senator Tom Wright\u2019s request for this review underscores the importance of protecting public resources and maintaining confidence in local government. We recognize questions have been raised about the city\u2019s handling of public funds, and we see this as an opportunity to correct misinformation, identify areas where we can do better and reinforce internal controls.<\/p>\n

Our staff will provide complete access to records, systems and personnel, so the audit team can thoroughly evaluate our policies and financial practices. We are committed to transparency and accountability, and we welcome constructive recommendations that will help us improve how we serve the public.\u201d<\/p>\n

City Commissioner Ken Strickland told Spectrum News in a Dec. 5 interview that if the state signs off on an audit, the city will be ready.<\/p>\n

\u201cDo an audit, they might find some other things that we need to take care of, I doubt it, but let\u2019s get this all out in the open and take care of it,\u201d Strickland said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TALLAHASSEE, Fla. \u2014 Members of the Florida\u00a0Legislature\u2019s Joint Legislative Auditing Committee approved an audit of spending in Daytona…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":76341,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[3140,274,43147,28,2287,139,275,232,234,233,278,835,2261],"class_list":["post-76340","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tallahassee","tag-app-local-state-politics","tag-app-top-stories","tag-devin-martin","tag-florida","tag-local-politics","tag-orlando","tag-spectrum-news-staff","tag-tallahassee","tag-tallahassee-headlines","tag-tallahassee-news","tag-top-stories","tag-vod","tag-volusia-county"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76340","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=76340"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76340\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/76341"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=76340"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=76340"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=76340"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}