YELLOW SHEET Office of the State Auditor of Missouri Claire McCaskill

Report No. 2005-03

February 2005

The following problems were discovered as a result of an audit conducted by our office of the Northwest Fire Protection District.

The district does not have a formal bidding policy.  The informal policy was to bid all purchases over $10,000; however, this was not in writing and there were no procedures for lower amounts.  As a result, bids were either not solicited or there was no bid documentation for some purchases, including used vehicles.  Additionally, the board made payments totaling $35,621 and $7,541 during the period January 2003 through August 2004 for insurance and propane, respectively, which were approved by the board in the minutes, but did not appear to be competitively bid. The district did not solicit requests for proposals for professional services and did not enter into written agreements for some of these services.  In addition, the district has an informal policy requiring purchase orders for all items; however, approximately 52 percent of invoices tested did not have a purchase order and receipt of goods or services was not indicated on 18 of 22 items received.  The district also did not maintain adequate documentation to support $3,213 paid to the volunteer fire fighters for calls during 2003.

The district's fire chief is the husband of one of the board members. The board meeting minutes do not indicate that this board member abstained from the votes regarding the appointment of her husband or the approving of his salary.

Both the deputy fire chief and assistant fire chief own businesses that are vendors of the district.  Their services were not competitively bid by the board.  To help prevent the appearance of, or actual conflicts of interest, the board should solicit bids for the services these business provide.

Several problems were noted regarding two grants totaling $96,984, received under the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Assistance to Firefighters Grant Program.  In 2003 and 2004, the district claimed more than was spent on approved items and used the additional monies to purchase items not approved in the grant application.  Additional items include three computers, five heat/motion detectors and a palm pilot.  None of these additional items were approved by FEMA, and the three additional computers and the palm pilot are not currently being used for training.  Other problems include the district failing to file the final grant report for the grant received in 2003, and that items purchased with the FEMA grants were not bid as required by the grant agreement.

The district does not have a written policy documenting appropriate vehicle use and logs maintained are not complete and do not always note required information.

In 2003, the board bought back its used fire truck, which had been wrecked and totaled out by the insurance company, for $700 with the plan to repair the truck.  Apparently, it was decided to not make the repairs and to sell the truck.  The board advertised for sealed bids with a minimum bid requirement of $750; however, no bids meeting the minimum requirement were received by the required date.  More than 30 days after the bid closing, a written offer of $300 was received and accepted by the Board.  The rationale and decisions concerning such transactions should be completely documented.

The district did not maintain copies of certifications of the current EMTs listed on the district's roster. According to state records, only three of the four EMTs noted on the roster were currently certified with the state.  In addition, training records of firefighters are not maintained, and  the district did not have a permanent medical director, in violation of state regulations. 

Also included in the report are recommendations related to IRS form 1099 reporting, budgetary practices and financial statements, minutes and by-laws, fixed assets, and district elections.

All reports are available on our website:    www.auditor.mo.gov

Complete Audit Report