By:  Diane Benjamin

Tonight the Normal Town Council will get a presentation on their newly released financial statements.  Included in the presentation is all correspondence from the auditor.

Here is the difference between Normal and Bloomington:  I used to get the same information from Bloomington – last year they denied my FOIA.  If you don’t remember, the auditor’s letter in Bloomington sited the SAME material weaknesses in internal controls year after year after year.  David Hales evidently refused to fix any of the problems.  Material weaknesses mean theft can occur.  The Council saw the same letters I did, Hales got raises anyway.

See this story:  https://blnnews.com/2015/12/01/transparency-fallacy/

Normal included everything in tonight’s packet:  http://www.normal.org/ArchiveCenter/ViewFile/Item/2154

Noted by the auditor:

This error was corrected – see page 78.

On page 81 is another letter that ends with this note:

It is a letter just like this that Bloomington hid last year.  Maybe they were tired of me writing the same Hales failures for years.  Hiding information is much easier.   The item of interest in this letter is:

The Town goes on to explain they are changing system to make verifying charges easier.

Meanwhile, Bloomington has refused FOIA requests for the actual PCard statements.  Citizens are expected to believe their recap is accurate.

Maybe Bloomington should turn oversight of the Coliseum to Normal.  I bet they would have checked the reports to insure the proper commissions were paid.  Their government functions better and they aren’t afraid to show screw ups and fix them.

Bloomington pretends nothing is wrong.

If Normal would just quit spending money  . . . .