Normally, the release of the annual Legislative Audit for the City of Alexander is not a must-read. However, considering events which occurred during the recent election cycle; the release of this report is greatly anticipated.
The incident that resulted in the following report began during the City’s Fall Festival on October 1, 2022. During the event the police department’s K-9 dog Leo was being walked through the city park’s parking lot when he hit on a vehicle belonging to Alexander’s bookkeeper Melissa Ratliff, who now goes by her maiden name Anthony.
Then Mayor Paul Mitchell decided he would deal with it the following week. Ratliff didn’t show-up for work as she should have on Monday, October 3. She also didn’t contact anyone at city hall that she wouldn’t be coming in that day. She did work the rest of the week. Unbeknownst to her Mitchell had scheduled a drug test for Ratliff and another female employee to be taken Monday, October 10.
When Ratliff arrived at city hall on Monday she was told to wait in her car because she and the other employee would be taking a drug test that morning. Before the other employee could finish what she was doing inside city hall Ratliff drove off and never returned. She was subsequently fired on Tuesday, October 11.
The City Treasurer, JoAn Churchill, stepped-in and began going through the books to determine the condition of the city’s finances. Also, payday would be coming and she needed to be sure all of the accounts could make payroll.
Once word leaked out that Ratliff was gone, being an election year, speculations ran wild and so did Freedom of Information requests for Ratliff’s time sheets and payroll statements. Photos of the documents were shared on the social media site Nextdoor by then candidate, now mayor of Alexander, Crystal Herrmann. Anyone with a calculator was asking how someone can work more hours than there are in a day, week or month.
Once Churchill realized there were problems with Ratliff’s time and pay the state auditor, who was still working on the 2021 audit, was notified and asked to add this to the audit. The following statements are taken from the Audit Report for 2021.
Before the Audit Report itemizes the offenses the report begins with the statement, “During our evaluation, noncompliance with state law and accepted accounting practices was noted in the offices of the Mayor and District Court Clerk.”
Under the category of Mayor the report states, “During the period January 1, 2021 through August 25, 2022, the Bookkeeper received salary overpayments totaling $20,088 and undocumented mileage reimbursements totaling $641.
“In addition, review of payroll records for the Bookkeeper, who was responsible for preparing disbursements and maintaining payroll records, revealed the following:
according to time clock cards, the
Bookkeeper was on sick leave.
for which, according to conference officials, the
Bookkeeper was not registered and there was no
evidence she attended.
did not always agree with stamped time clock cards.
The Bookkeeper was terminated on October 11, 2022.”
It should be noted the list of city officials has Ratliff listed as the “Recorder” instead of the “Bookkeeper.” Also, that same list does accurately reflect that Ratliff was appointed May 17, 2021 to serve as interim Court Clerk after the death of the previous clerk. She was then replaced by Janet Guess who was appointed September 1, 2021 as the new Court Clerk.
The Court Clerk did receive one noncompliance report which states, “Balances remaining in the bank were not identified with receipts issued for cases not yet adjudicated and payments made on all unpaid individual time accounts, as required by Ark. Code Ann. § 16-10-209.”
The Arkansas Attorney General’s Office is investigating the charges laid out in the Audit Report. It’s been reported subpoenas have been issued ordering the submission of documents.
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