By Dave Baumeister
County Correspondent
SIOUX FALLS – Although the Minnehaha County Treasurer’s office turned in three more reconciled bank statements for the Oct. 29 commission meeting, it still couldn’t escape more criticism from a county town council member.
During public comments, Gerry Karpen of the Sherman Town Council brought up criticisms about money they weren’t receiving from the county.
Property tax money is paid into the county twice a year, and the county treasurer and auditor’s offices are responsible for getting a portion of that money back to the local governments where the property was taxed.
Karpen said that the failure to receive monthly checks has happened three times in the past year, and he referred to a recent call with Minnehaha Treasurer Pam Nelson about checks being “lost in the mail.”
He said that Nelson told him that the county does not notify individuals when checks have not been cashed – apparently not even other government entities within the county – but, instead, sends those uncashed funds to the Office of Unclaimed Property in Pierre after June 30th of each year.
(Later in the meeting, county auditor Bob Litz made it clear that his office DOES contact people about uncashed checks before sending anything to Pierre.)
“It is inconceivable to me that the county would adopt such a cavalier treatment of property tax funds, and that attitude is simply not acceptable,” Karpen said.
“These are monies that are forcibly taken from our residents,” he continued, “under the very real threat of the loss of their homes.”
Karpen then tied the problem back to the delinquent unreconciled bank statements, saying that it was “important the county proceeds with more timely reconciliation of bank statements so that missing checks can be discovered within an acceptable time frame.”
Nelson, who made a rare appearance at a weekly commission meeting, was present to respond to Karpen’s statement, saying “the county is doing nothing different than it has for nearly 50 years.” (Although she later amended that statement to “100 years.”)
She also cited that the auditor’s office was the place that wrote the checks, and she called on Litz to explain further.
“I’d like to thank Pam for volunteering me here,” Litz said, and then went on to explain that he had contacted Karpen, and he believed they found a way to deal with the problem.
He is planning to help Sherman set up a direct bank deposit for their county revenue so the “lost in the mail” problem wouldn’t happen again.
In other banking related matters, the commission received reconciled bank statements for January, February and March of 2019, and according to the future agenda, they are looking to get caught up through September 2019 at the Nov. 5 meeting.
The Minnehaha County Commission has its regular meetings each Tuesday at 9 a.m. on the second floor of the county administration building at 6th and Minnesota in Sioux Falls.
These meetings are open to all, and public comment is always encouraged.
