Posted on 03/28/2024 5:03:55 PM PDT by Twotone
South Carolina has collected about $1.8 billion in a bank account over the past decade and state and private accountants are still trying to figure out where the cash came from and where it was supposed to go.
“It's like going into your bank and the bank president tells you we have a lot of money in our vault but we just don't know who it belongs to,” said Republican Sen. Larry Grooms, who is leading a Senate panel investigating the problem.
It's the latest trouble with the state's books and the two agencies, typically led by elected officials, that are in charge of making sure government accounts stay balanced.
Last year, the elected Republican comptroller general — the state's top accountant — resigned after his agency started double posting money in higher education accounts, leading to a $3.5 billion error that was all on paper. The problem started as the state shifted computer systems in the 2010s.
The latest issue appears to involve actual cash and elected Republican Treasurer Curtis Loftis, whose job is to write checks for the state.
Investigative accountants are still trying to untangle the mess, but it appears that every time the state’s books were out of whack, money was shifted from somewhere into an account that helped balance it out, state Senate leaders have said.
“Politics really shouldn't come into play. People prefer their accountants not be crusaders,” Grooms said Tuesday, just after the Senate approved putting a constitutional amendment before voters to make the comptroller general an appointed position. The proposal now goes to the House.
(Excerpt) Read more at yahoo.com ...
The smartest thing to do, if it turns out to have excess cash, is dump $1.8 billion in debt.
Smell like a slush fund they lost track of.
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from where? Two words: Hun Ter
Do I hear reparations?
That’s a good problem to have.t
I did some work for the state and forgot to cash the check.
It might be good in the short term. But if their bookkeeping system is this bad, there’s likely a deficit somewhere else waiting to be found.
Ok...ok...I’ll take it.
No need to thank me...
Least I can do...
If they found that in my state I’d be screaming for a tax rebate. A tax rebate for those who actually paid taxes, not more backdoor welfare for those who didn’t.
Give it back to taxpayers.
‘“It does not inspire confidence. But the good news is no money was lost,” Republican Gov. Henry McMaster said.’
Sorry but how does he know that? The finances are so messed up, they have no idea where money is coming from or where money is going. $1.8 billion is not chump change.
I understand, but you are leaving the children the debt they did not accrue and that’s not fair. We should endeavor to not do that to our children. They didn’t benefit from our present day of spending.
I would support tax cuts as the debt and interest get reduced.
My guess: It’s a bribe to be disbursed by the ‘rats to those who do as they’re told regarding how the ballots are handled in the coming election.
So, they’ll likely build two miles of light rail.
Yes. That would be the most thing to do in a politician’s mind that does not intend to return the money to the tax payers.
As it was said in office space(paraphrased) “i screwed upwith the decimal point.” Any one need a red stapler?
Apparently, when the state switched computer systems in 2010, no one checked to make sure all state banking accounts “came over” to the new system. No one noticed. It seems that there would have been someone’s job to notice. That in itself is concerning. In 2010 the state was probably still getting written statements each month. However, even if not, it should have been someone’s job to download monthly statements for each state account and have the department in charge of those funds reconcile those with their records. That such a thing wasn’t done sounds suspicious to me.
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