Comptroller’s Office Sends Letter to Personnel Commissioner Requesting Explanation Regarding Troubling Payroll Irregularities from Collins’ Chief of Staff

ERIE COUNTY, NY—Yesterday, Erie County Comptroller Mark Poloncarz released a review to assess compliance with established Erie County Personnel Policies and Procedures for recording attendance for the time period of January 1, 2011 to June 30, 2011.   This report is a follow-up to a 2009 audit of the County’s payroll records to review the current status of similar payroll records and to assess compliance with established Erie County Personnel Policies and Procedures for recording attendance. 

In 2008, the Collins administration implemented the employee self service “swipe card” timekeeping system (“ESS”) to replace the paper “sign-in, sign-out” sheets as a means to both save time and minimize fraud and abuse. 

The review found that eight departments within Erie County are still not utilizing the County’s ESS system with sixty-three (63) separate locations across the County not outfitted to record employees’ swipes.  Additionally, forty-seven (47) employees including Collins’ Deputy County Executive, Chief of Staff and several Commissioners are not recording their daily attendance at work by swiping as mandated by Erie County policy and procedures.

“After implementing the swipe card system in 2008, at great expense, in order to inject transparency into a payroll process ‘rife with abuse,’ it is particularly disturbing that Collins doesn’t believe his top political appointees should be held to the same standard as every other County employee,” said Poloncarz.* “Every single employee in my office, including my two Deputy Comptrollers and Associate Deputy Comptroller abide by the County’s policy.  This review indicates a clear case of ‘do as I say, not as I do,’ and sets a terrible example for the County’s workforce.”

Beyond the scope of the review, auditors found that after having an individual reprieve from complying with the County policy to record attendance via the swipe card system since its implementation, Christopher Grant, Collins’ Chief of Staff, inexplicably began utilizing the swipe card system as of July 18, 2011.  After a review of those swipes and SAP payroll records, auditors uncovered discovered that in recent weeks Grant has manually overridden swipe attendance records, resulting in additional hours being logged on his official payroll records. 

Also yesterday, in light of audit’s findings, the Comptroller’s office sent a letter to Erie County Department of Personnel Commissioner John Greenan seeking immediate explanation for Christopher Grant’s payroll record irregularities.

Poloncarz added, “While I am glad that Collins’ Chief of Staff has decided to use his swipe card to account for his time like every other County employee, the clear discrepancy between the time recorded on his swipe card and the overrides he manually entered for payroll are inexplicable and raise the possibility of fraud and abuse.”

According to Chapter VI, Section 1, of the Erie County Personnel Policies and Procedures Manual, “Deliberate falsification of any time or pay record by an employee is considered fraud and is subject to appropriate disciplinary action.”

Poloncarz concluded, “If someone is falsifying time worked for themselves or another employee, whether they be the lowest paid employee or a high ranking official, he or she must be held accountable just like any other County employee would be.  I call on the County Executive to prove to the taxpayers that the same rules that apply to every other County worker also apply to his own inner-circle by investigating this matter and discipline accordingly.”

A copy of the final report and letter sent to Commissioner Greenan is attached here.  

* “Collins was shocked to find that Erie County used an inefficient paper time keeping and payroll system that was ripe with abuse, manpower intensive, and wasteful.  A new electronic swipe card system is replacing the antiquated paper based system.”  Under “Achieving Significant Savings for Taxpayers” in Accomplishments Section on Erie County Executive’s Website:   http://wwww.erie.gov/exec/?accomplishments.html

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