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FAMU Fires 41 Employees After Audit

By Teesa Johnson
Black College Wire

Florida A&M University has terminated 41 employees as a result of new findings of payroll discrepancies, in a continuing investigation stemming from a university-wide audit conducted in April.

Photo by Vaughn Wilson/ Courtesy of the Capital Outlook Castell Bryant, Florida A&M's interim president, told trustees her investigation of payroll irregularities will continue.

Another 21 employees are being investigated by the university�s Office of Inspector General, and three cases are being referred to the State Attorney�s office, university trustees learned at a June 30 meeting.

Most of the fired employees worked in the university�s Institute for Urban Policy and Commerce, which Interim President Castell Bryant abolished this year. It was administered by Patricia McGill, and reopened under a new director in June.

Trustees were just informed of the dismissals as Bryant strove to end the fiscal year in the black, and to address the allegations that employees received pay for hours they had not worked and for jobs they had not held. The fiscal year ended June 30.

The names of the dismissed employees were not disclosed in a report to the trustees from the Audit Committee. The report, made by Trustee Pamela Duncan, described five categories of employees who were terminated:

• Employees with multiple jobs who were not reporting their time accurately. Some were leaving their primary job early to report to a secondary one. Others were not showing up to work in positions for which they were receiving a check. Some were being paid for time not worked.

• Employees of main campus departments with local responsibilities, who were living in other cities or states and had full-time positions with other organizations.

• Employees who were working at off-campus locations but had no documentation of the time worked. Some had no time sheets; others had submitted no leave forms for sick or annual leave time taken.

• Some payroll certifiers and supervisors who were not monitoring or checking the hours worked or leave taken by staff members.

• Faculty members who were being paid for teaching classes they did not in fact teach.

Duncan�s report said the 41 fired employees had a combined salary of $1.2 million.

The dismissed employees included the entire staff of the Institute for Urban Policy and Commerce, which had been created in 2000 by the state Legislature to improve economic opportunity in low-income communities.

�There were 21 people terminated from this department, with only five or six of them being full-time employees,� Duncan said. �The remainder of the [fired Institute] employees worked from remote locations.�

Bryant said that the investigation was continuing and that the university would conduct random audit checks during the next school year. She would not identify the terminated employees even to the trustees at their public meeting.

�You can only get that information [with] a subpoena from a judge,� Bryant said.

The Rev. R. B. Holmes Jr., a trustee, said, �Giving names could open major liability on the university.� He added, �It�s best that we leave personnel matters in the hands of the president because that is what she is here for.�

But Trustee Barney Bishop said he was disappointed that the names of the employees who were terminated could not be released.

�If these people were all violating the law, we should know who they are and be calling in the FBI,� Bishop said.

Bishop also expressed concern that Bryant terminated employees without consulting the board.

�We should rely on the president to make personnel decisions, but the fact that over 20 people were terminated without talking to the Board of Trustees in advance is deplorable and not appropriate,� he said.

�I am probably a minority in this situation, but I think it is wrong that we are not told what is going on before something happens.�

Challis Lowe, board chair, supported the interim president in her decisions.

�I disagree with you, Trustee Bishop, because the president is the only one responsible for hiring and firing employees,� she said.

Other trustees agreed.

�We hired the president to do a job and that�s what she�s doing,� said Trustee Regina Benjamin. �We either support the president through all of her decisions or we fire her.�

Duncan�s report also gave examples of findings from the April audit, which led to the continuing investigation into university payroll problems.

The audit found that the university issued 4,308 checks and vouchers on April 1, but that only 4,234 employees picked up checks and vouchers.

Five checks, worth a combined $24,626, and 69 vouchers worth more than $3 million were never picked up.

Some 286 employees were receiving two or more checks because they held multiple jobs at the university. Their checks were worth almost $3.3 million, according to the audit.

Teesa Johnson is a graduate student in journalism at Florida A& M University.

Posted July 5, 2005