Fort Lauderdale Community Redevelopment Agency (CRA) is so lacking in financial safeguards that thousands of dollars in tax money was spent on a farewell event for a City Commissioner and a retirement party for a city employee.
It cost the CRA $8,000 for the “farewell event” for the unnamed City Commissioner and more than $14,000 for the unnamed city employee’s retirement party, according to Fort Lauderdale City Auditor John Herbst’s examination of the finances of the CRA released Friday.
Partying with public money are perhaps the most striking abuse found by Herbst. It certainly was not the only misuse of the CRA finances that he found.
“This operational audit of the City’s Community Redevelopment Agency concluded that the City and CRA lack adequately designed controls to prevent and detect errors in budgeting, procurement and compliance with relevant statutory requirements in a timely manner,” the report states.
The CRA is a multi-million arm of Fort Lauderdale’s government. The agency collected roughly $8 million in fiscal year 2015 to use in three areas of the city — Central Beach, Northwest-Progresso-Flagler Heights and Central City.
