MFP, KPMG And Prejudice
As you will recall, dear reader, I am on a mission to try and recover some of the $68 million lost by the City in the MFP file settlement. Unfortunately, I cannot get 11 key people in the City interested. Obviously I am referring to the Mayor and Council.
I understand that they are acting like "corporate managers." Write off the bad debt and bury the file since every time it is mentioned people might blame them for the mess again. I know it is only money and the $68 million will be spread over a number of years BUT it is taxpayers who will suffer, not a company that gets tax write-offs.
I have asked before about why the City is not trying to get the $68 million back. Perhaps the City has already asked Counsel to give a legal opinion on issues I have raised (I even talked to George Wilkki, the City's solicitor about them the day after I fell at City Hall Square when we happened to meet.) No one has told me yet that what I am suggesting is without merit.
A Star Editorial has again prompted my demand for action by Council. In that Editorial the Star mentioned that KPMG was Essex County Council's auditor at the time that the MFP deal was signed.
But wait a minute....wasn't KPMG's forensic arm hired by Windsor's Counsel to investigate the MFP fiasco? Who were the City's auditors? According to an email from Onorio Colucci, Windsor's Acting Treasurer, it was KPMG for 2000 to the present.
The obvious action to consider these days in a matter like MFP, whether fair or not to the auditing firm, is to look at suing one's auditors for professional negligence. Unfortunately that is life. How then could KPMG Forensic be retained to look at a matter in which KPMG Auditing might be involved and in which it might potentially have a liability? Didn't anyone realize the potential conflict of interest? Didn't anyone care?
When one reads the KPMG forensic audit report as I have done, one is sickened by the mess that the City was in respecting leases. Did the City's auditors, KPMG, have a responsibility to point that out, did they and to whom?
Of course I am not suggesting that KPMG did anything wrong or was negligent...But it is an obvious matter that needs addressing and needs finality one way or the other in my opinion.
The other matter still outstanding is who released the KPMG Report improperly so that the City's case was badly weakened. Mr. Sutts, the City's lawyer, said "It would be extremely prejudicial to our case if it [the KPMG Report] was widely circulated." Shouldn't that person have a responsibility to pay as well since presumably the settlement was worse than otherwise could have been reached?
Simply, I would like to know the answers. It is only $68 million at stake of taxpayer money!
I understand that they are acting like "corporate managers." Write off the bad debt and bury the file since every time it is mentioned people might blame them for the mess again. I know it is only money and the $68 million will be spread over a number of years BUT it is taxpayers who will suffer, not a company that gets tax write-offs.
I have asked before about why the City is not trying to get the $68 million back. Perhaps the City has already asked Counsel to give a legal opinion on issues I have raised (I even talked to George Wilkki, the City's solicitor about them the day after I fell at City Hall Square when we happened to meet.) No one has told me yet that what I am suggesting is without merit.
A Star Editorial has again prompted my demand for action by Council. In that Editorial the Star mentioned that KPMG was Essex County Council's auditor at the time that the MFP deal was signed.
But wait a minute....wasn't KPMG's forensic arm hired by Windsor's Counsel to investigate the MFP fiasco? Who were the City's auditors? According to an email from Onorio Colucci, Windsor's Acting Treasurer, it was KPMG for 2000 to the present.
The obvious action to consider these days in a matter like MFP, whether fair or not to the auditing firm, is to look at suing one's auditors for professional negligence. Unfortunately that is life. How then could KPMG Forensic be retained to look at a matter in which KPMG Auditing might be involved and in which it might potentially have a liability? Didn't anyone realize the potential conflict of interest? Didn't anyone care?
When one reads the KPMG forensic audit report as I have done, one is sickened by the mess that the City was in respecting leases. Did the City's auditors, KPMG, have a responsibility to point that out, did they and to whom?
Of course I am not suggesting that KPMG did anything wrong or was negligent...But it is an obvious matter that needs addressing and needs finality one way or the other in my opinion.
The other matter still outstanding is who released the KPMG Report improperly so that the City's case was badly weakened. Mr. Sutts, the City's lawyer, said "It would be extremely prejudicial to our case if it [the KPMG Report] was widely circulated." Shouldn't that person have a responsibility to pay as well since presumably the settlement was worse than otherwise could have been reached?
Simply, I would like to know the answers. It is only $68 million at stake of taxpayer money!
posted by JoeBlog at 12:48 p.m.
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