ABC-7 Xtra: Audit finds inconsistencies in taxpayer-funded gas cards
Update: The city of El Paso's Financial Oversight and Audit Committee will meet Thursday, May 4 to discuss the internal audit.
EL PASO, Texas (KVIA) -- El Paso City Mayor Oscar Leeser says an audit found inconsistencies in the usage of taxpayer-funded gasoline credit cards that are provided to city council members for city-related business.
In a phone interview with ABC-7, Mayor Leeser said those inconsistencies in usage lead to bumping the findings up to members of the Financial Oversight and Audit Committee (FOAC).
ABC-7 also asked the mayor if any preliminary findings in the audit had risen to the level of a criminal investigation with the El Paso Police Department. Leeser said it's not something he's been briefed on or is aware of at this point.
On Tuesday, the El Paso City Council approved two items that dealt with council's usage of taxpayer-funded gas cards: 1) it wants to put a spending cap on the now unlimited gasoline cards and 2) directing the city manager to give each representative a monthly report on expenditures, including gasoline card usage.
City Representative Art Fierro said he placed the items on the agenda because there’s no checks and balances system or policies in place to hold council members accountable for the taxpayer funded credit cards.
“I had asked for some gas receipts from a previous representative, and they were unable to be produced for over 90 days, and so to me there’s an issue there,” Fierro said.
Also at the council meeting, El Paso City Chief Financial Officer Robert Cortinas said the Streets & Maintenance Department is currently responsible for overseeing the gasoline cards, which he said includes processing, delivering the cards, and posting the expenses.
"I believe all of the members of council, and I know the FOAC know there's currently an audit going on by the internal auditor and so out of that, whatever comes out about recommendations, we've already started looking internally to see what we could do to make that a little bit easier,” Cortinas told council members.
ABC-7 asked Mayor Leeser if the internal audit includes former and current members of council. He said the audit is for 2022 to date.
Leeser also said during his former term in office, there was a $100 monthly cap on gasoline card usage, however, he said that changed and he wants to know when it changed and why.
The mayor reminded council there are certain state and local laws they have to follow.
Senior Operations manager and interim City Manager Cary Westin reiterated the position.
“It goes back again to your official capacity and if your utilizing funds, public funds for your official capacity," he said.
“It should be commensurate rather with the amount of work and travel you're doing with the funds that you're going to be using for the fuel card so it's not to utilize a fuel card, fill up your tank, use it for personal and use it for business so that's incumbent on anybody that uses that fuel card is to make that estimate based on what your official capacity is going to entail in terms of the use of that card that you're doing the right thing," Westin said.
ABC-7 asked City Representative Brian Kennedy, who is chair of the Financial Oversight and Audit Committee, if there was misuse of the gasoline cards. Kennedy said they will wait to see the final report from the internal auditor, which he says will be May 17.
ABC-7 has filed a public records request with the city on behalf of our viewers under the Texas Public Information Act. Those requested public records included receipts for gas and purchasing cards.
The city initially sent a letter to ABC-7 saying it would take 32 hours to produce the records and would cost $576. We’ve asked as an alternative to inspect the records.
