Advocacy agency will survive recent woes, official says

A North Idaho agency that provides volunteer advocates for children involved in court cases will survive the scandal of missing or misspent funds, the abrupt resignation of its director and allegations of shredded documents and office break-ins, a board member said Thursday.

Jim Elder, vice president on the board of directors for CASA, said a Coeur d’Alene accounting firm has been reviewing the books for the North Idaho chapter to determine how much money, described variously as $30,000 to $130,000, was spent by former director Rhonda Naylor without board approval.

A former staffer was discovered shredding documents in the office after Naylor left, but told questioners she was shredding outdated files. As recently as last weekend, Coeur d’Alene police were called to take a report of unlawful entry after other staffers found entry doors unlocked. The employees told police they believe documents are missing.

The local chapter of CASA, Court Appointed Special Advocates, has a $200,000 annual budget, with the money coming from grants and fund-raisers. Earlier this week, Elder announced CASA had $5,000 in the bank and $13,000 in outstanding bills.

CASA provides about 200 volunteer advocates for the 1st District Court, which covers the five northern counties. The volunteers are currently looking out for the interests of about 600 children who are involved in court cases as victims, suspects or just as a family member.

The money crisis brought CASA within a whisker of shutting down. A bailout by the national CASA office on Wednesday, in the form of a $90,000 emergency grant, has kept the doors open and staffers paid, Elder said. The emergency grant comes with strings attached and can only be spent on keeping the office running. It’s for things like rent, utilities, salaries of the five paid staffers, not for bills or fund raising.

In the meantime, national CASA policy has frozen other grants and funds coming into the local office until financial discrepancies are cleared up.

“We still need money,” Elder said Thursday. “Idaho CASA and national CASA and all the other funding grants and agencies are holding up money until we get a clean bill of health. I understand why they do that.”

Elder said he expects the audit to be completed in several weeks. “What we want is a finance review to uncover discrepancies and mismanagement and potential misappropriation,” he said.

CASA has not filed criminal complaints against Naylor, who cited family reasons for abruptly resigning in late April, just as the unauthorized expenditures were coming to light. Naylor apparently has gone to Portland, though no one seems to be able to reach her.

Naylor circumvented CASA’s oversight policy of having two signatures on every check by obtaining a debit card on CASA’s bank account, Elder said.

“Rhonda was passionate. She was committed to the kids. We had no indication there was anything wrong” until some long-delayed financial reports were delivered to the board of directors at the May meeting, Elder said.

Elder said he believes Naylor overspent on two of CASA’s big fund-raisers. Both events lost money. A CASA volunteer said one of the fund-raising expenses came when Naylor put up family members at the Coeur d’Alene Resort for several days during the fund-raiser.

“This is a sensitive area,” Elder said. “This may just be a mismanagement issue, not an illegal act.”

Acquiring the debit card, he said “is questionable,” but Elder said pursuing criminal charges “won’t bring us any money to support the program. Holding her accountable is something all of us want, but it won’t bring us any money.”