Nearly $50,000 in deposits from Mason County Public Works goes missing
How does nearly $50,000 in deposits disappear into thin air? That’s what a recent fraud investigation was unable to determine after Mason County Public Works staff discovered $47,588 in “misappropriations.”
According to an investigation report released by the Washington State Auditor’s Office, staff members first realized that money in a deposit bag from a county transfer station had not actually been deposited in September of 2021. This was after a customer had called the county to report that a check they had written a month earlier had not cleared their bank account.
It was eventually determined that 55 deposit bags between April 2021 and September 2021 were unaccounted for.
Typically, solid waste attendants at Mason County landfills are tasked with collecting fees for people throwing away garbage. At the end of the day, they compile receipts into a deposit bag and place it in a safe at the Shelton Transfer Station.
From there, the program manager takes the bag to the public works department, where the funds are prepared for deposit by one of three senior accounting technicians.
The county report detailed how “none of the technicians use a daily receipting report to confirm staff turned in all deposit bags.” Between that and the fact that several people had access to the bags from start to finish, the investigation was inconclusive.
“The county could not assign responsibility because it could not determine when the bags disappeared between the attendants filling them and the accounting technicians preparing the deposits,” the investigation concluded.
