While just a few weeks ago the City of Morton was joyful and abuzz with the sounds of chain saws and other logging equipment during its annual Morton Loggers Jubilee, the tone in the city was significantly more serious on Monday, Aug. 26, as the Morton City Council met for its monthly meeting.
Over 40 Morton residents filled the Bob Lyle Community Center in Morton for Monday’s meeting after the Washington state Auditor’s Office announced former Morton City Clerk-Treasurer Tammy Clevenger had been accused of misappropriating nearly $950,000 in public funds over nearly a decade in one of three audit reports released earlier on Monday.
Those in attendance expressed anger and disappointment, and many asked how the fraud could have been allowed to happen over all those years.
“It’s not fair, to our people who work and live here and support this town,” Morton resident Rena Richards said.
Although charges have yet to be filed, Morton Police Chief Cole Cournyer told those in attendance Monday his department has an ongoing investigation and intends on bringing charges forward soon.
“If you want the information, the auditor’s office has released what they released. I wasn’t for it, but they did it,” Cournyer said. “That’s all the information we’re going to have this time regarding these two matters … There has not been an arrest made. This is a civil investigation. The investigation now comes to me, and I’m going to be having a discussion with who I need to do to finish this. That’s all we have at this time.”
The second matter involves another state auditor’s office report on alleged credit card fraud committed by former Morton Police Chief Roger Morningstar, who resigned last year amid claims he lied about his background and sexually harassed staffers and others.
Cournyer added he did not have a time frame for when the investigations would finish and charges would be filed.
Clevenger started in her position as joint clerk-treasurer in 2012. During the time the fraud occurred, Jim Gerwig was Morton’s mayor until 2016, when Dan Mortensen was elected to fill the position. Mortensen then served two terms before Mead was elected last November.
It was in 2022 when the Morton City Council approved a resolution separating them and creating two standalone positions of clerk and treasurer, Morton Mayor Ricky Mead, who was elected in late 2023, said on Monday.
“With the elimination of the joint clerk-treasurer position, there was no longer a single person responsible for accounting, bill paying and payroll reconciliation,” Mead said. “After this change, former City Clerk-Treasurer Tammy Clevenger resigned.”
Mead acknowledged the damage done to the residents’ trust in their city government, and assured those in attendance that no current city staff were involved with stealing city funds.
“Also there is no evidence the theft involved any customer utility accounts,” he added.
The City of Morton also has “risk management” insurance to cover the loss of the $950,000; however, the insurance will not cover the costs of the investigation.
“Without just sitting down and actually talking with the insurance company, I’d be lying if I said either way how much they are gonna pay, or if they’re not gonna pay anything. But, from my assumptions and what I’ve been told, yes, they are gonna cover it. That’s what they’re there for,” Mead said.
It was in September 2022 when the state auditor’s office reached out to current Morton City Clerk LuAnn Ward, informing her of the financial record balance issues to give the city a chance to reconcile the records before moving forward with an audit.
Ward began going through Morton’s old financial records and soon discovered massive discrepancies, which she immediately reported to Mead, the Morton City Council and the state auditor’s office.
In total, Ward spent “thousands of hours,” with state auditor officials also spending hundreds more, investigating the extent of the fraud.
The investigation uncovered a variety of misappropriation schemes totalling $937,584.
“I think we owe LuAnn a big round of applause for her work,” Mead added. “When she came across the money that came up missing and found out there was fraudulent stuff going on, she literally puked.”
Those in attendance applauded Ward for her work during the investigation. Ward also assured those in attendance city staff had completely changed the ways they handle and transfer money.
Before, bank deposits were taken in unsealed bank bags by only one person.
“Now, it’s put into a sealed bank bag. It’s initialed and counted by two separate people on two separate occasions. It’s then sealed, initialed by both persons and taken to the bank to be unsealed,” Ward said. “That is something in the past that did not happen … I want everyone to know we’ve gone out of our way to change everything. And there is nothing now that two or three people don’t have their hands in, agreeing to and double checking, triple checking.”
As for the investigation costs and audit fees, Ward told those in attendance the city intends on recovering the money through the legal system.
The state auditor’s office accountability and financial audits that first detected the misappropriations can be found at https://tinyurl.com/4dvcxuyw and https://tinyurl.com/mr49n2rj.
For more information on the alleged fraud committed by Morningstar, visit https://tinyurl.com/evx6psfm.
Read more on the city's response here: https://www.chronline.com/stories/morton-will-work-to-ensure-former-clerk-accused-of-stealing-950k-is-prosecuted-to-the-full,360732
