Auditor report tells of Darr’s irritation

Troopers as drivers his due, he said

Lt. Gov. Mark Darr told a legislative auditor last month that he cannot receive more income from the state than his salary under the Arkansas Constitution but that there isn’t a constitutional amendment that says he “has to be screwed” either, according to the auditor’s written report on the conversation.

Darr, a Republican from Springdale, said he would be using the services of the Arkansas State Police “to his benefit” and that auditors “would be seeing an increase in travel for the State Police,” during his Nov. 20 telephone conversation with senior audit supervisor Andy Babbitt, the latter wrote in a two-page report.

According to Babbitt, Darr said his predecessors had state vehicles for transporting them, but he doesn’t.

During a telephone conversation that lasted about 14 minutes, Darr also told Babbitt that the lieutenant governor should have been informed in a previous audit or by Democratic state Auditor Charlie Daniels’ office about laws covering travel reimbursement and that the state auditor should no longer act as the disbursement officer for the lieutenant governor’s office.

The report was obtained by the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette from the Legislative Audit Division under the Arkansas Freedom of Information Act.

Darr’s telephone conversation with Babbitt came as the lieutenant governor was preparing his response to the division’s audit of his office for the fiscal year that ended June 20, 2012.

The audit - released Dec. 12 -found that Darr received $9,298 in improper mileage reimbursements for more than 22,000 personal vehicle miles because he is not eligible to be reimbursed when he commutes between his “official station” in Little Rock, where he normally reports to work, and his residence.

After finding $438 more in improper travel expenses, auditors recommended that Darr reimburse the state $9,836 in total. Darr is making arrangements to repay that money, according to his spokesman.

In a written statement issued by his office Thursday, Darr declined to comment other than to say, “I did have a conversation with Legislative Audit and expressed great concern and frustration.”

Several attempts to reach Darr for further comment by calling his cellphone Thursday and Friday were unsuccessful.

Amendment 70 bans constitutional officers and legislators from receiving, in addition to their salaries, “any other income from the state of Arkansas whether in the form of salaries or expenses.”

Since Darr told Babbitt that he would be using the services of the Arkansas State Police “to his benefit,” state police shuttled him through various troops from his home in Springdale to Little Rock on Dec. 11 and transported him back home by relay to Springdale on Dec. 12, according to state police spokesman Bill Sadler.

Sadler said Friday that Darr hasn’t told state police that he plans to ask troopers to transport him more often.

Since dropping his bid for the Republican nomination for the 4th Congressional District on Aug. 29, state police also have driven Darr at least four other times on long-distance trips.

In late October, Darr explained that state police officers drive him between his Springdale home and sites around the state so he can talk on his cellphone without endangering himself or others.

According to Babbitt’s memorandum, Darr told him that he should have been informed either in a previous audit or by the state auditor about laws related to travel reimbursements. Darr said he didn’t understand how his travel reimbursement problems were not discovered in a previous audit.

Deputy Legislative Auditor Jon Moore said the travel reimbursement problems were found by auditors in the latest audit of Darr’s office after they noticed a significant increase in travel expenses in the fiscal year that ended June 30, 2012.

The office’s travel expenses declined in the fiscal year that ended June 30, 2011, when Darr was in office for six months, he said.

Peggy Gram, chief deputy in the state auditor’s office, said the state auditor’s office has been paying the bills and acting as the disbursing officer for the lieutenant governor’s office for at least 40 years because the lieutenant governor’s office only has a handful of employees.

A veteran accountant with the state auditor’s office discussed “the basics” with staff members in the lieutenant governor’s office and referred Darr’s staff to the state Department of Finance and Administration regulations after Darr took office, as when others took the office, she said.

“State rules and regulations are for a layperson coming into governmental accounting sometimes difficult to understand,” Gram acknowledged.

Gram said an accountant in her office informed one of Darr’s staff members that he wasn’t allowed to charge gasoline on a state credit card for a private vehicle after the accountant “got those bills … and said, ‘No we can’t do this.’” during Darr’s first year in office in 2011.

Bruce Campbell, Darr’s chief of staff, said Darr no longer charged gasoline to a state credit card, after his office was informed about that and he instead sought reimbursement for his mileage expenses.

Auditors reported that Darr charged$2,339 in personal expenses on a state credit card and later reimbursed $1,202 to the state and submitted a check dated July 1, 2012, for $1,137 to the auditor’s office. But Darrsaid his bank hasn’t processed the check for $1,137 yet.

On Wednesday, Arkansas Ethics Commission’s staff members reported that the commission found sufficient evidence for the commission to rule that Darr violated various ethics laws in response to ethics complaints filed by Darr and liberal blogger and attorney Matt Campbell.

Campbell said Darr was found to have improperly spent more than $44,000 in campaign and taxpayer funds, but Darr’s attorney, Dan Greenberg of Little Rock, said most of the $31,000 in campaign funds at issue were improperly disclosed - not improperly spent.

Front Section, Pages 1 on 12/21/2013

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