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Dear Editor:
After 11 months, the investigation into allegations against the Treasurer’s Office moved another inch today.
An Indiana State Police investigator requested from the county auditor a copy of the county ordinance pertaining to NSF (non-sufficient funds) property tax payments. It is unknown to me if the investigator received the county ordinance in effect at the time under question or the current one. They are not the same.
At question is whether or not a county employee should have had their penalty released for an NSF tax payment. At the time of the payment, which was ultimately late due to NSF, both the Indiana State Board of Accounts and county ordinances allowed penalty releases for NSF payments. That is not the case now as NSF payments are penalized if not made good by the deadline.
Again, this is another nothing-burger presented by disgruntled clerks, who are either ignorant of the previous ordinance or purposefully misleading investigators and the public. The former seems unlikely since those clerks were or are all long-term employees.
I’m sure the papers wouldn’t leave out of any article pertaining to this matter the existence of contradictory relevant ordinances and guidelines at the time of the alleged malfeasance.
Actually, I’m not.
Bryan Goode
Cicero