By: Charles Romans
Carter County Times
The treasurer of the Carter County Tourism Commission has stepped down amid a financial scandal that found the commission’s account overdrawn and the board struggling to meet commitments they’ve already made.
Carter County Fiscal Court met in special session yesterday (Wednesday, July 10) to discuss the issue brought before it by the tourism commission. Commission chairman Chris Perry informed the court of a breach in finances at the tourism commission and made the court aware of the steps that had been taken to address the issue and prevent any future breaches.
Perry told the court that on June 20, 2024, he received a call from Commercial Bank that the tourism commission’s bank account was overdrawn.
“My first reaction was how is that possible,” Perry told the court.
He said that he was advised to come to the bank and look over the account statements. It did not take long, he told the court, before he recognized numerous expenditures that he knew the commission had not authorized.
“I immediately called all the board members and had a conference call,” Perry said. “I advised them of what had been discovered, and after that I contacted the judge executive and the county attorney.” Perry said that after speaking with the judge and the county attorney, he and the attorney agreed that it would be best to turn over what had happened to the Kentucky State Police (KSP).
After turning over the information to the KSP, Perry said there followed another series of calls and a special meeting of the Tourism Commission Board.
“I had asked for bank statements from the day we opened that account to the present,” Perry told the court. “We were able to get those statements and looked over them at the special meeting.”
After looking over these statements Perry said the commission also recognized numerous expenditures that had not been authorized by the board. It was also at this meeting that Perry informed the board that he had met with board treasurer Renee Stewart and accepted the treasurer’s resignation.
Perry never identified Stewart by name, referring to her only as “the treasurer,” in his communication with the court. Stewart, however, was the last individual to operate in that role. When asked for confirmation he stated that it was still an open investigation and he was unable to comment further.
The next step taken was to close the account that had been compromised, Perry informed the court.
“Then in our regular meeting on July 1, 2024, they appointed me as the interim treasurer to handle getting a new account set up. I have done that and put a stipulation on the new account that it now requires two signatures on a check. And I have eliminated the use of any debit card on the account.”
“We were fortunate that there were some checks that had come into the judge executive’s office,” Perry told the court.
Those checks, he said, were used to balance the compromised account and bring it out of a negative status. A check from Carter Caves that had just been received was used to open the new account, Perry said.
“I have also recently found out that some of our bills I thought had been paid had actually not been paid. I have dug into that over the last couple of weeks, and I now have invoices from everyone we are aware of that we owe money to,” Perry told the court.
Perry also told the court that the one check they had received from Carter Caves would not be enough for the board to cover their commitments that had been made earlier in the year. Those commitments included a promise of twelve thousand dollars to the Carter County Fair and a commitment to the Shriners for advertisement and entertainment for the Shriners Bluegrass Festival.
“We knew that we had to find a way to honor those commitments and we knew that we didn’t have enough time,” Perry explained.
He said there were numerous businesses that had not yet paid the tax which goes toward funding tourism, but that when that money was collected the tourism commission would be able to recover. Bu, he stressed yet again, there was not sufficient time left to collect this money to fulfill their current obligations.
Perry said because of these needs the board approached Commercial Bank about a line of credit that does not obligate either the fiscal court or the county. Any payment connected with this loan, Perry said, will be offset by the Carter Caves payment alone. This line of credit, he explained, was only to fulfill standing obligations, which might not actually require the full amount of the credit line. Perry said that the board has halted any future obligations until such time as the board is once again solvent.
Due to there being an ongoing investigation, Perry said that he was prohibited from discussing any particulars of the breach such as amounts, the individual or individuals involved, or resolution to the breach.
“We can’t comment to anyone about any of this until that investigation is complete,” he told the court.
Moving forward, Perry told the court that there will be a monthly accounting of what checks were written by the tourism board, and that he would also share that monthly accounting with the judge executive’s office. All future checks the tourism board receives will be sent to that office as well for assistance in logging expenditures and facilitating bookkeeping and anything requiring reporting to the Department for Local Government (DLG).
“I want to apologize that this happened under my watch,” Perry told the court. “But I can assure you that it’s not going to happen again as long as I am on the board.”
Contact the writer at charles@cartercountytimes.com
