Susannah Sudborough|The Enterprise
BROCKTON— For the second time in the last decade, a state audit of Brockton Area Multi-Services Inc. (BAMSI) found misuse of thousands of state dollars by the organization.
A June auditreport states that the non-profit human services organization charged over $11,000 to state contracts for non-reimbursable spending between July 1, 2017 and June 30, 2019.
"We've got a lot of work to do, and we're doing it and taking it very seriously," BAMSI CEO Peter Evers said.
The charges were largely connected with BAMSI's former president and CEO, Anthony Simonelli. The audit details how Simonelli charged over $2,000 in state contracts for three life insurance policies for himself, over $2,000 in car insurance for himself, and over $6,000 in gas for his personal car use.
The rest of the charges were made up of sales taxes, undocumented restaurant and travel charges, and a $25 alcohol purchase. Together, these totaled less than $1,000.
Simonelli declined to comment on this article.
In the report, the State Auditor's Office said these issues were caused by a lack of oversight and review within the organization.
"BAMSI officials stated that the expenses were erroneously charged to state contracts because of staff turnover, and that two missing receipts could not be produced because they had been misfiled," the report reads.
"BAMSI does not have internal controls in place to ensure that its staff reviews all the president and CEO’s expenses for reasonableness and allowability before they are paid."
The report recommends that BAMSI ensure that staff review the CEO and president's spending before charging it to state contracts, and that it pay the state back for the over $11,000 that should not have been charged.
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BAMSI has agreed to these changes, though current BAMSI CEO Peter Evers said that the organization will not be paying back the state, per the state's request.
Evers said he no longer uses his company credit card regularly, and that any expenditures he does charge are reviewed by the chair of BAMSI's board of directors on a monthly basis.
Evers also said the organization's old system for tracking these charges was outdated, partially due to BAMSI growing so much as an organization during the period that was audited,and that that was part of the problem. He said the new CFO has instituted a much better system.
"This is not fraudulence.It's more about a system that wasn't sophisticated enough to allocate money appropriately," Evers said.
Evers also pointed out that the amount of money incorrectly allocated is very small compared to the organization's $100 million budget, but said that doesn't mean the report isn't a big deal.
"It doesn't mean that we don't take it seriouslyif it's just a small amount of money. Because if we don't fix it, the next time it could be an awful lot more," he said.
Evers also defended Simonelli, saying he knows him well.
"He's done wonderful things for this organization, and I know that he would never knowingly defraud the company or the state. I absolutely know that he is a man of high integrity," he said.
This isn't the first time BAMSI has been found to be improperly charging the state for its spending. In 2015, a stateaudit found that BAMSIerroneously charged the state$18,593 for restaurant meals, alcohol and tobacco from July 2011 to June 2013.
At the time, Simonelli saidthe alcohol and tobacco purchases were part of fundraising events and dinners, and that state money was not used to pay for the alcohol and tobacco, butthat other revenue, such as money from a golf fundraiser, was used.
Simonelli stepped down as BAMSI's president and CEO in December 2019. Eversstarted as CEO in March 2020.
In the report, the state auditor thanks BAMSI for its cooperation with the audit.
The new audit also found mishandling of donations to the organization. According to the report, BAMSI could not provide letters of acknowledgement for the receipt of all donationsandthat some donations were misclassified as being able to be used for anything, instead of the specific purpose listed on the donation.
The report found that over $25,000 of donations did not have acknowledgement letters, and that over $1,000 were misclassified.
"As a result, there is a higher-than-acceptable risk that restricted donations may not be used for their intended purposes," the report reads.
The report saysBAMSI cited high turnover in their philanthropy and marketing department for these issues.But according to the report,the State Auditor's Office found a lack ofmonitoring controls that would ensure acknowledgment letters were sent and that restricted donations were accurately reflected in accounting records.
Evers also cited a dual system for intake of donations and a bad record-keeping system for the issues.
The state auditor's recommendation was that the organization institute new controls. The report says BAMSI complied with the recommendation, and cited the followingas BAMSI's response:
"BAMSI has just recently hired a new Vice President of Philanthropy and increased the number of personnel in the department. BAMSI implemented a new donation tracking software (Donor Perfect) which will provide Philanthropy with better documentation for all donations and donors. Reconciliations between the data in Donor Perfect and the general ledger are performed on a monthly basis and any discrepancies are investigated in a timely manner."
Enterprise staff writer Susannah Sudborough can be reached by email at ssudborough@enterprisenews.com. You can follow her on Twitter at @k_sudborough. Support local journalism by purchasing a digital or print subscription to The Enterprise today.
