In an effort to strengthen the city’s commitment to ethics and compliance, the Tallahassee City Commissioners unanimously passed two new policies, the “Whistleblower Policy” and the “Anti-Fraud Policy.”
During an audit of the city’s ethics code and critical policies conducted by Inspector General Dennis Sutton, it was noted that the city does not have an established Whistleblower or Anti-Fraud procedure. Consequently, the City recommended such policies be adopted.
The Whistleblower Policy will protect individuals who take action to report known or suspected instances of wrongdoing. The policy prohibits any discipline, dismissal, or any adverse action against those individuals who report “unlawful activity, misfeasance, malfeasance, gross waste of public funds, gross neglect of duty, or gross mismanagement.” It also states all city employees have the responsibility to report such behavior.
Prevention and eradication of fraud is the singular goal of the Anti-Fraud Policy. The policy states the city has “zero tolerance for fraud,” and the city will immediately investigate and deal with any suspected misconduct. It is explicitly noted that the city will handle alleged transgressions without regard to the “wrongdoer’s length of service, position, or title.” Furthermore, the policy directs Inspector General Sutton to investigate any complaints of speculated fraudulent acts.
These new procedures are considered “critical policies” and therefore, all city employees will made aware of their responsibilities related to the new policies on an annual basis.
How about adopting any measure that reduces the taxes the working men and women pay. How about adopting any measure that shrinks the size of City Government.
If they were really against fraud, they wouldn’t be spending 20 million dollars of our taxes to fix FSU’s stadium.
The words released by the Commission cleverly “sound” legitimate. However if a competent attorney not connected in any way with the COT were allowed to review the policies I would wager we would find the actual policies and procedures to be ineffective and likely protective of fraudsters within the COT and Commission.
Seriously are any readers thinking: Thank God we are going to have honesty and transparency going forward? If so I need to speak to you about a great investment…I’ve got a fine money making bridge up in Brooklyn NY I would just love to sell you a couple hundred shares in.