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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Whitman Auditor Caught In Financial Mess County Commissioners Attack Money Spent For Mailings Critical Of Their Performance

Eric Sorensen Staff writer

If it’s summer, it must be time for another high-profile brawl between the Whitman County auditor and the board of commissioners.

So just as the combines started to roll on the hills outside town, the county courthouse spawned a new political melodrama starring Auditor Genie Goldsworthy.

The plot once again revolves around a political power struggle and allegations of financial misconduct. It also has an expanded cast of characters: 10 auditor’s office employees, all subpoenaed to testify to commissioners in a hearing Monday morning.

The three commissioners are trying to find out how much county money was used on a four-page letter the auditor’s office reportedly sent to hundreds of officials across the state last month.

Among other things, the letter asserted that the commissioners are “continuing to operate outside the laws of Washington state” and that the county is in a “‘Big Time’ financial mess” that Goldsworthy is not being allowed to fix.

Commissioners, who deny Goldsworthy’s charges, say they were forced to subpoena the employees after Goldsworthy refused to provide an accounting of the mailings cost.

Goldsworthy cryptically suggests otherwise.

“This is not about postage,” she said Friday without elaborating. “It’s about a message.”

But Goldsworthy was slow to accept responsibility for the memo. That’s one reason county officials like Chief Deputy Prosecutor Ron Shirley are stumped at accounting for her behavior.

“You’d have to be a psychologist, someone who’s extremely familiar with paranoid schizophrenia” said Shirley, who is also the county’s civil attorney. “It’s just illogical.”

Since Goldsworthy took office three years ago, she has quarreled with the commissioners over issues ranging from staffing levels for her office to who should set the county budget.

State officials have periodically visited to negotiate a truce.

Last summer it was Secretary of State Ralph Munro; the year before it was the state audit director and the head of the Washington State Association of Counties.

Peace has yet to erupt.

Since January, Goldsworthy has written more than 70 letters to the commissioners making various claims. Department heads talk about being swamped in paperwork as they are caught in the auditor’s drive for constant accountability.

“She just doesn’t understand the process,” said Treasurer Mary Crawford. “There’s a lot of things she’s asking for that she could have if she would just take the time to look them up on her computer.”

Dealing with Goldsworthy has become a black hole for county officials’ time, “and there’s no bottom,” said Commissioner Hollis Jamison.

“It’s time that’s wasted and it’s not necessary,” he said. “If she would cooperate and work with us, we’d be getting a lot further along on stuff.”

Several employees have been called on to refund expense payments of as little as 7 cents because they tipped for more than 15 percent on a meal.

“She wants an itemized list of what you eat,” said Finance Director Dick Brown.

Goldsworthy’s four-page letter claims the county commissioners are violating state law by having Brown prepare county financial reports.

State Auditor Brian Sonntag said Friday that is a management decision that is the commissioners’ to make.

Also, in a letter to the board, Sonntag said his annual audits of the county have not turned up “any instances of misfeasance, malfeasance or nonfeasance by the commissioners.”

For all her concerns about accountability, Goldsworthy at first told the Moscow-Pullman Daily News she knew nothing about the unsigned letter when asked about it last month. She then said she “would bear full responsibility” for the letter and pay the costs of its mailing, but she refused to say how much it cost.

Goldsworthy declined to be interviewed and made only limited remarks in phone conversations Thursday and Friday.

“Its all a legal matter, and I can’t say anything,” she said. “I would love to give you the story.”

On Friday she said she “didn’t write the letter” but that she ordered it and edited it. She declined to respond to Shirley’s remark.

“I’m not hostile,” she said. “I always did want to work it out with the commissioners. They were the people that prevented that from happening.”

, DataTimes