NO BENEFIT
The reasons that accounting procedures exist is to insure the financial integrity of the accounting system.
Transparency and good internal controls help minimize errors, and prevent waste and fraud. An elected board
provides an additional layer of financial oversight and transparency. The removal of elected governance
eliminates checks and balances which allows such conditions to exist and the prevents the expeditious
resolution of such. There is no benefit to the Emergency Manager failing to resolve anomalies that are
discovered in annual audits because it perpetuates the instability of Detroit Public Schools and further
exacerbates the condition of the school district and potentially reduces the financial resources to the classrooms.
The fact that these anomalies were not addressed timely suggests a lack of commitment to financial integrity,
transparency in the School System by the EM. The Emergency Managers’ actions could have dire
consequences.
ETHICS
Good internal controls help minimize errors, minimize the occurrence of waste and minimize the occurrence of
fraud. Generally, you would expect employees of the district to act in an ethical manner which reflects the
employees commitment to the citizens and the students of the school district.
ALTERNATIVES
When an anomaly is found the normal process is to timely address the anomaly in the next accounting cycle or
by the time the next audit is done. The alternative is having a democratically elected authority be able to review
the anomalies without fear of retaliation and other repercussions.
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