Same Old Song And Dance

After long search, Fall River selects
and hires new city auditor

By Michael Holtzman
Herald News Staff Reporter
Posted Sep 29, 2010 @ 02:00 PM
Last update Sep 29, 2010 @ 05:05 PM


FALL RIVER — After a lengthy search, the city has hired a Quincy comptroller with a high degree of accounting experience and education as its auditor, Mayor Will Flanagan said Wednesday.

Krishan Gupta of Berkley will start the job Oct. 12 at a top-step salary of $80,292.
 
For the past three years, he’s worked at Quincy College, an enterprise of that city, as senior director of accounts and finance. He’s handled budgets, payroll, ledger maintenance and preparation of financial statements.

His duties included working with external auditors to finalize annual financial statements and audits. Those are among the key roles of the auditor’s office, which is behind in both its financial and grant audits, according to the state Department of Revenue.


Flanagan called the new auditor “a problem solver.”

He said Gupta met with financial department heads at length last week. He also spoke with the DOR and the city’s auditing firm, Hague & Sahady in Fall River, to learn about the current backlog. “He sat down and he made an assessment. If he didn’t feel he could make a difference for the city, he was not going to take the job,” Flanagan said.


Flanagan said he was seeking an auditor with municipal auditing experience to replace Kevin Almeida who took a comparable financial job in early July with the city school department.

Flanagan also cited Gupta’s extensive education in finance and accounting and college teaching experience.


Educated initially in India where he grew up, Gupta holds a master’s in business administration from the University of West Georgia and master’s in accounting from the Graduate Center City University of New York.


During more than 20 years of teaching accounting in New York and Massachusetts, he taught at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth from 1998 to 2004 and is on the adjunct faculty at Bentley University in Waltham.


Human Resources Director Madeline Coelho said Gupta had been interviewed this summer during a first round of screenings and was a top candidate in a small field.


She noted he was experienced with the city’s MUNIS system and with the Uniform Massachusetts Accounting System.


Gupta accepted the job last week and took a small pay cut from his job in Quincy, Coelho said.


For a year before that he worked as comptroller at Massasoit Community College in Brockton. He was a mid-level manager of the State Bank of India from 1974 to 1985.


“I’m excited about it. I think I can make a difference,” Gupta said in a phone interview.


Informed the DOR is awaiting the late audits, he said, “I’m aware of the challenge and the work that is cut out for me. Challenges are good.”


He expressed optimism he’d receive the cooperation needed to accomplish the tasks as city auditor.


A resident of the SouthCoast and Berkley since 1998, Gupta said the shorter commute will help with his family life. He is remarried with a 2-year-old son, and he and his wife have five college-age and grown children from before they married.
E-mail Michael Holtzman at mholtzman@heraldnews.com.


Let's all hope that our new Auditor has the right stuff for the job ahead. More importantly, let's all hope this guy is a completely honest person capable of not playing "hit the number" for the numerous grant, especially education grants (5-7 years worth in some cases) and general ledger accounts (since FY09) that have been allowed to lay about unaudited and, reportedly, in very bad shape.

I hope he realizes that his staff stinks and that he doesn't have enough warm bodies to provide him with loyal, qualified assistance in this mighty effort. No, we better start calling him "Revis", because he's all alone on that island of his, and in municipal finance, that's most definitely NOT a good place to be.

I have no idea who this man is. I had no idea who the "Finance Director" was when he was hired, and he's been so great he wasn't allowed a voice in the auditor's hiring! It's never a good sign when both men appear to have a similar work-skill background but the supposed underling, the Auditor, has more high level accomplishments than his supervisor, Mr. Grab. (I don't know about you, but a Treasurer named "GRAB" makes me chuckle...a  lot...when I hear the name. It's pure Fall River!)

Aside from the obvious connection between these two titans of municipal finance, Grab and Gupta, that being the City of Quincy, there could also be a tie between Gupta and the GREAT CADIME (HA!) through UMASS/Dartmouth. But none of that really matters. You see, in this day and age of unemployment, even amongst professionals, or what pass as professionals, it is rare indeed that TWO of the scant few finance professionals in the City would come from the same City and both be willing to take a pay cut for the privilege of toiling in the GREAT AND WONDERFUL COMMUNITY OF FALL RIVER. HMMMMM. Something's not right about that! NO FOOLING!

But we shall receive answers soon enough. You never know, maybe either Grab or Gupta will be the new Sylvanagan patsy to take the blame for the next set of completed financials for the City, and I'm sure they will tell one sad and sordid tale. Don't forget, it will be the report of the last year of the reign of the GREAT DESTROYER CORREIA. I guess Mr. Almeida, Correia's nephew or godson, or whatever relative of Correia he was, and ex employee of Hague & Sahady just didn't want to be associated with the nasty truth so he split for greener and quieter pastures at the School Department. Wouldn't you?! Let that crap hammer fall on the new guys, right? Don't you just love all the Fall River "Profiles in Courage"!

Let me take this opportunity to inject some terrifying factoids into this discussion:

• DOR isn't kidding. The last administration, and the current one, made promises to DOR to complete financial reports in a timely fashion. They better get them on time, or else. I wouldn't want to be Sylvanagan if the reports are not timely filed and then have the State Aid withheld until they are! Say "buh-bye" Sylvanagan!
• At a meeting held at MMA this week, some truly hideous FY12 state budget scenarios were laid out. Apparently, because this is an election year, the state FY11 budget was balanced by maxing out revenue forecasts and plying the final budget with scads of one time federal monies and depleting the "rainy day" fund. Everyone is terrified that the ballot proposition to cut the state sales tax to 3%, if passed, will bankrupt the state since the balanced FY 11 budget counts on a full year of receipts at the current sales tax rate, and with rosy receipt figures at that! WITH a cut in sales tax rate if the ballot question passes, one MMA estimate indicates a whopping 30% across the board cut in the state budget for FY 12. 30%! The lowest estimate, given no change in the sales tax rate, is an even still awful cut of up to 18% in the FY12 budget. That's across the board, including LOCAL AID! Chew on that one in an election year Sylvanagan! The new guy Gupta might as well stay right where he is because the City will not be able to afford him, or anyone else , with a 18 - 30 % cut in local aid. I mean, that's a joke and a half! I'm so glad I left the business when I did! Again, say  "buh-bye" Sylvanagan!

So, all this is an academic discussion, the new Auditor, the late financial reports, the lack of knowledge of Public Finance of anyone in elective capacity in Fall River. Fall River cannot survive FY12. Impossible. And did not the School Department just use fed monies to hire 130 new people? Maybe they know more than the rest of us, but if the Republicans take control of either the House or Senate in Washington in a month, continued massive ed and local government aid will be cut back severely, if not all together.

Fall River. It's just a disaster waiting to happen!