The parent organization at Meadowlark, a PK-8 school in Erie, recently removed its treasurer after a financial review found seven unauthorized withdrawals, totaling about $70,000, from its fundraising account.\n<\/p>\n
The PTSA, or Parent Teacher Student Association, treasurer was former Erie Trustee Sara Loflin. Loflin was also the executive director at ProgressNow Colorado, a progressive advocacy organization.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn the midst of a cancer treatment crash, I made an honest mistake in a volunteer capacity,\u201d Loflin wrote in an email to the Daily Camera. \u201cI apologized and resigned, and the funds were fully restored.\u201d<\/p>\n
Loflin did not respond to a request for clarification on the reason for the withdrawals. The \u201cindividual involved\u201d fully repaid the missing money in March, according to the PTSA. The PTSA filed a police report in early March with the Erie Police Department, which declined to release the report because the incident is still under investigation.<\/p>\n
In a written statement, ProgressNow Colorado said that after it learned of \u201cserious allegations involving a member of our staff,\u201d it placed that person on leave \u201cpending further investigation of the facts, and to ensure that our organization and leadership holds itself to the highest standards. At this time, we have no evidence that any funds at the center of the allegations affected any other organization, including ours, but we continue to investigate.\u201d<\/p>\n
The organization later added that \u201cthe employee in question is no longer with ProgressNow Colorado.\u201d<\/p>\n
Meadowlark PTSA President Desiree Wright declined to be interviewed, instead pointing to a statement she read at a parent meeting.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen something does not meet our standards, we address it. Promptly, carefully, and with integrity. We took immediate steps to secure our accounts, review our records thoroughly, and resolve the issue. The matter was identified quickly, and all funds have been fully recovered,\u201d she wrote in the statement.<\/p>\n
According to information provided to parents, PTSA officers noticed several financial discrepancies in bank transactions that had started in December. Along with the seven unauthorized withdrawals, they found four unexpected deposits into the account. The group had raised close to $164,000 this school year through several fundraisers, including a fun run.\n<\/p>\n
Once they discovered the discrepancies in March, according the PTSA officers, they filed a fraud alert with the bank and closed the account. They also suspended access to PTSA accounts, emails and accounting software and notified the Colorado PTA of the financial discrepancies.<\/p>\n
The PTSA has not publicly stated that Loflin made the withdrawals, only that they removed her as treasurer. According to the PTSA, all of the officers have access to financial accounts.<\/p>\n
On March 30, the PTSA notified Meadowlark parents about the financial discrepancies. After declining to accept Loflin\u2019s resignation, the PTSA removed her as treasurer on April 1. The school district has suspended Loflin\u2019s volunteer status pending the outcome of the police investigation.<\/p>\n
In her statement to parents, Wright said the PTSA has added additional financial safeguards, including requiring approval by two board members or a board vote for all withdrawals of more than $500. The organization\u2019s board also will now have two treasurers, one who will be in charge of finances and a second who will provide oversight, reviewing financial statements monthly.<\/p>\n
\u201cAt the center of everything we do is a shared purpose, supporting all students at Meadowlark. Every action taken throughout this process has been with that responsibility in mind: to protect this organization\u2019s ability to positively impact students, to strengthen our practices, and to ensure that all funds are managed with care and used as intended,\u201d Wright wrote in her statement. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The parent organization at Meadowlark, a PK-8 school in Erie, recently removed its treasurer after a financial review…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":172820,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[77517,1676,7250,202,227,136,138,137,1677,241,182,139,1680],"class_list":{"0":"post-172819","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-erie","8":"tag-boulder-valley-school-district","9":"tag-colorado","10":"tag-colorado-news","11":"tag-crime-and-public-safety","12":"tag-education","13":"tag-erie","14":"tag-erie-headlines","15":"tag-erie-news","16":"tag-front-range","17":"tag-latest-headlines","18":"tag-local-news","19":"tag-news","20":"tag-weld-county"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/172819","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=172819"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/172819\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/172820"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=172819"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=172819"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=172819"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}