District Attorney Greg Mashburn requested the audit of the city in southern Oklahoma, which has almost 3,000 people.
State auditors found Lindsay had financial difficulties because of mismanagement and a lack of oversight by city officials from July 2019 through June 2022. State Auditor and Inspector Cindy Byrd said no one was looking at the warning signs.
“Lindsay’s elected leaders have a legal obligation to oversee the City’s finances. Instead, the City’s financial mismanagement was exacerbated by ineffectual leadership that failed to maintain records and oversee City functions,” Byrd said in a press release. “As a result, Lindsay taxpayers have been shortchanged by hundreds of thousands of dollars.”
Findings included excessive p-card spending, late fees, improper use of restricted money, issues with late financial audits and problems with utility revenue, according to the audit. Officials said the late audits prevented the city from applying for grants and hampered the council’s assessment of the city’s financial situation.
“Two audits were filed more than a year late, primarily delayed due to the City’s disorganized and incomplete financial records,” according to the audit.
Although officials uncovered mismanagement and lack of oversight, Byrd said the office classified less than $2,000 in expenditures as fraudulent.
“On a very good note, the City of Lindsay is working to resolve the issues we discovered and appears to have turned the corner financially,” Byrd said. “The City has caught up on its audits and is now fully eligible to apply for grant money.”
In the press release, officials from the Office of the State Auditor & Inspector noted the following:
- The city under-billed commercial customers by about $1.5 million as of June 2024, and city officials expect to recover roughly $676,000 of that amount.
- About $152,460 in revenue was also lost because of failure to process rate hikes, collect late fees and bill for current usage, according to the audit.
- Two city employees and two city council members got utility services despite not paying for them for four to eight months.
- Almost $500,000 in sales tax revenue earmarked for the Lindsay Public Works Authority was kept in the General Fund account and was not used for the authority’s restricted purposes.
- According to the audit, credit card payments of about $223,000 annually were made without purchase orders or board approval and oversight.
- Because of missing records, $34,488 in card payments could not be verified.
- Lindsay City Manager Rebecca Niernberger made about $531 in inappropriate fuel purchases and $1,789 in questionable food purchases. She got $727 in fuel for her personal vehicle, and the city had no records to support $10,651 Nierberger’s purchasing card expenditures.
- The city also has no records to support $20,156 of purchasing card expenditures from City Clerk Kathy Hammans.
