Cedric and tight girl Winnie is not known for her ability to grasp things…like the fact that her hero is on a slippery slope.
Another $8.4 million in Covid-19 money is a good thing for the Tribe, but a bad thing for Cedric Cromwell. See, all things federal come with a lot of rules and regulations.The Cromwellians can’t play funny with the money. Lotta sad faces on the Zoom a couple a weeks ago and especially when the accountants were there this past Wednesday. The accountants were there to tell them the do’s and don’t s. It also means more scrutiny don’t ya know The whole scrutiny thing was the reason Cedric decided to suddenly become Mr. Transparent.But the bigger problem is that the very badly needed money is being handed out by a group of people under the most serious cloud of legal scrutiny there is.Course our brilliant Treasurer Gordon Harris missed the first meeting on this. He hasn’t been to a Council meeting in eons….but he’s still getting that hazardous duty check for (never) entering an empty building.
The question remained “What’s the Grand Jury subpoena about? The Tribe wanted to know. And guess
Poor Knees Knocking…Poor Poor Knees Knocking, he thought he was so smart.
what ? They couldn’t get Rita Gonsalves to vote for an an emergency meeting to talk about it. And she want’s to be tribal chairman. So they had the Zoom Council meeting for the lawyer to tell the Council ( that already knew the drill and the details) that the specifics were part of attorney client privilege. Course the client is the Tribe, not the Council. Okay, but the $100K lawyer from Todd & Weld slid off track and said it was up to the Council. Ha ! So Cedric promised to allow a discussion in Executive Session. Right. Well it’s not a good idea to talk about the contents of a Grand Jury Subpoena for obvious reasons. But if Cedric doesn’t understand the seriousness of this matter he needs his head examined…….again.
The first zoom meeting was pretty comical.First off, they were still looking for the minutes from May 27 and before that. The Secretary didn’t have them either and they couldn’t approve what they didn’t have. The Tah Tah years are definitely missing for as many years as we have bitched about them and that’s been a long time. A government without record is not a government. But back to the meeting. Because Cedric’s overview of the status of the large appropriation, the guidelines for spending and the fact that it had to be spent by December 31. More importantly, it meant the lazy Council would actually have to design a spending plan that meets the criteria of federal guidelines to the benefit of the tribal members who really need that money. ‘We are going to hear how the money will be spent because it will be audited.”
Well, David Pocknett had something to say about the irony of the spending plan, the audit and the subpoena. He raised the big problem of the 2019 & 2020 Tribal budgets that have yet to materialize or be approved by the Tribe. Cedric kept mumbling that ” the Council never passed it David.” To that David replied, ” This is why this stuff is happening … this is why you have subpoenas coming.” Well of course Cedric was silent. He’s touchy about subpoenas.
Here’s are the highlights of the guidelines for this money according to the auditing firm:
- The Inspector General of the US Department of Treasury has oversight of the $8.4 million. Non compliance, or unspent would be returned to the government.
- The auditors said, “The Tribe must be careful about records and documentation.” Must do an assessment of need: for payroll for pubic safety, & health, employment training,health insurance, health facility expansion, health, emergency response and pandemic teams and telework policies.
The documentation will have to justify the expenditures according to the accountants
The Cares Act allows the Tribe to spend money based on need. It can be done based on the average cost for needs. The average cost of Elders light bills for example. When the Elders came up…..Jessie brought up gift cards and how the government frowned on the use of gift cards. She pointed to Donald Peters who distributed restaurant gift cards from 99 to Tribal Elders under his Title 6 grant. The popular effort provides$100 worth meals to the Elders. Jessie just kept on haranguing about it. To his credit, Cedric told her repeatedly that Peters got approval from his supervisor. Other council members reminded Jessie that Peters keeps excellent records of who receives the cards, which has been a problem in other circumstances.They also brought up the use of wavers for conflict of interest which seems to be a problem for Jessie.
Many Tribal members over 18 were looking forward to receiving a check, but it will be based on individual need, not a per capita amount .
Any violation of expenditures in other areas will be taken back by Treasury. And there will be quarterly audits.
After an hour of a detailed and thorough power point presentation, Winnie asked for do’s and don’t s. STUNNEDED. Jesus.
Elections have consequences.
