County Money Being Paid to City Of Defuniak

You have a point Misty. But having known Bill Chapman for over 30 years, he usually says whatever he is thinking. I am hopeful we will find out for sure.

They knew they had received it in the past and due to the fact that the County appears to have not shared the letter from the Tax collector (Mailed July 13th) with the City.

Wonder why ?

I have a sneaking suspicion there is more that you know than just the snippets you have posted here. How will this play into the expansion of the audits by the Auditor General? Or does it? Many of us saw the heated exchange between you and Imfeld (albeit we couldn't hear it) but the finger pointing and the puffed out chest of Imfeld sure indicated you had him riled. I'm sure the 10 or 15 minute conversation with Larry helped make for a good cooling off point.

I get the impression this is one of those "this is the way its always been" things and the scandal hinted at isn't there. I'd bet Imfeld and plenty others knew, but again "this is the way its always been". It's clearly a cost savings and I applaud Bob for finding it.

You have a point Misty. But having known Bill Chapman for over 30 years, he usually says whatever he is thinking. I am hopeful we will find out for sure.

Ya know Danny...I don't like rehashing our differences but sometimes it just makes the point so much better than I could possible do. Chapman was a certified law enforcement officer, who was sworn to uphold the laws and the Constitution of the United States, who kept his mouth shut to keep his job when Quinn McMillan was breaking the law and building churches from the ground up so, I guess you'll forgive me for not believing he didn't "know when to hold em and know when to fold em".

I get the impression this is one of those "this is the way its always been" things and the scandal hinted at isn't there. I'd bet Imfeld and plenty others knew, but again "this is the way its always been". It's clearly a cost savings and I applaud Bob for finding it.

Absolutely! We do differ on whether or not there isn't a scandal. It's scandalous enough knowing that most of them knew and flat out denied knowing what they clearly did.

I want to Thank Joyce Sunday for challenging me to dig a little deeper concerning the payments to the City of DeFuniak Springs.

I went on line and reviewed their audited numbers for the Road and Bridge payments. Records since 2006 were available on-line.

The 10 year total distributions are:

Total - $ 644,160

In addition I made an additional contact and discovered that a meeting between representatives of the Tax Collectors office, the County Attorney and the City Attorney was scheduled in July to research and discuss this issue. After committing to attend the City Attorney, Clayton Adkinson did not attend.

I am currently writing to State Senator Gaetz providing ALL of the documents, email and texts in my possession seeking a change in the areas of concentration for the forensic and operational audit to include ALL departments of Walton County government.

There's that name again...Adkinson.

I want to Thank Joyce Sunday for challenging me to dig a little deeper concerning the payments to the City of DeFuniak Springs.

I went on line and reviewed their audited numbers for the Road and Bridge payments. Records since 2006 were available on-line.

The 10 year total distributions are:

Total - $ 644,160

In addition I made an additional contact and discovered that a meeting between representatives of the Tax Collectors office, the County Attorney and the City Attorney was scheduled in July to research and discuss this issue. After committing to attend the City Attorney, Clayton Adkinson did not attend.

I am currently writing to State Senator Gaetz providing ALL of the documents, email and texts in my possession seeking a change in the areas of concentration for the forensic and operational audit to include ALL departments of Walton County government.

Thank you very much! It was my hope this is where all this was leading!!

Also, thank you Joyce Sunday!!

Bob wrote

In addition I made an additional contact and discovered that a meeting between representatives of the Tax Collectors office, the County Attorney and the City Attorney was scheduled in July to research and discuss this issue. After committing to attend the City Attorney, Clayton Adkinson did not attend.

Are you surprised by that? I often walk past those fancy new accommodations and wonder how the hell a defense attorney could afford such spacious digs when the majority of the population North of the bay is mostly indigent, retired and working poor individuals just trying to keep a roof over their heads and other local attorneys are working out of rented spaces.

No

What are the chances for a Grand Jury Investigation for this mess? Surely if the State Attorney wants to "witch hunt" he could pursue an old rival.

Thanks Bob, awesome job!

I think those of us not living in DFS owe Bob Hudson a huge "thank you" for bringing this to light.

I think those of us not living in DFS owe Bob Hudson a huge "thank you" for bringing this to light.

Those of us who do live (at least those of us who don't like who is actually running DFS) are thankful as well!!

I'm very confused by the monetary figures posted here and trying to get clarification but something tells me there is a hell of allot of money that has exchanged hands over the years and the City (IE) Clayton Adkinson has some explaining to do over all of it, not just the budgeted money. Where is the rest of it?

So they know about it when it comes to including it in the budget, but have no knowledge of it otherwise?

So they know about it when it comes to including it in the budget, but have no knowledge of it otherwise?

Makes perfect sense right?

In the words of BCC Chapman..."the grand jury could indict a monkey" so, let's get this show on the road and line those monkeys up!

Go watch the video. Here I've cued it up for you:

Board of County Commissioners on 2015-10-13 4:00 PM - Regular Meeting - Oct 13th, 2015

It goes on from there and based on what I can hear it appears this was a tax collected by the collectors office and paid directly to the city thus bypassing the county budgeting process. There may or may not have been something notifying the county of this transfer, but it's probably been sent since 1915. It sounds like it was discovered and was being addressed as early as June or July of 2014 by county staff.

Oh my, just another mistake. No wonder Bill Imfeld made so light of the Grand Jury report Tuesday night. This happened under his watch, and where was Carr Riggs and how did they just miss this for years. Just one more thing. The BCC, my oh my. We need anothre Grand Jury not for who fired who but who is minding the store!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Larry Jones??????????? God help us all.

State needs to appoint a Special Prosecutor from outside this area.

No Eddins & Co.

FDLE needs to step in as well, division of Executive Investigations.

Time for ADKINSON to step aside and let someone without family connections come in and give an unbiased opinion.

Road and bridge tax? I don't understand why a bridge tax and I'm even more confused about the road tax.

Defuniak has 2 (state maintained ) highways. 331 N/S and hwy 90 E/W We have a single train track bridge that runs approximately 200 to 300 feet (if that) across hwy 331 @ hwy 90 and the bridge is taken care of by the Federal Govt. All other roads inside the City limits are the Cities responsibility. WTH have we been paying on for 101 years?

The Tax Collectors office sends a "Distribution Report" to the OMB Office at the end of each fiscal year showing collections and "Distributions" made from the Ad Valorem taxes collected on behalf of the County. I have attached the copy of the 2014 report which I obtained by a Public Records Request. I knew this report existed based on my tenure with the SWMCD. I reviewed it annually after our Account used it to reconcile what we had budgeted against actual receipts.

If they were unaware of the "distribution" they either don't reconcile their receipts or they are incompetent.

I was cut off by "The Hammer" (was the OMB Director for many years) or I would have shared additional information.

I confirmed today that the letter sent to the County Administrator in July WAS NOT shared with Commissioners prior to the meeting. (Had it 3 months)

I was cut off by "The Hammer" (was the OMB Director for many years) or I would have shared additional information.

Imfeld cut off a Public Records Request?

No

During the BCC meeting

I would still like to know what roads and bridges inside Defuniak have been paid for or is that just what they called the payment?

Bob, thank you for the thank you but I didn't really do anything. And I only look at SoWal twice a week or so, so I miss a lot.
Somewhere in the past few pages I scrolled through, someone said that the Tax Collector's letter from July wasn't shared with the city. However, Sara Bowers (love her) was one of the cc's. Prior to her becoming City Manager, she was Finance Director for the City of DeFuniak for MANY years and she is a sharp cookie. So, I am a bit bewildered that the city either had no idea why they were receiving a large sum of money from the county, or had no idea that they were receiving funding at all? How could you miss that?