Transcript of the Testimony of Leslie Haase

Date: November 20, 2013 Volume: I Case: In Re: Joplin Critical Investigation

Printed On: December 1, 2013

Holliday Reporting Service, Inc. Phone: 417-358-4078 Fax: 417-451-1114 Email:daholliday@hotmail.com Internet:

Leslie Haase

In Re:

Joplin Critical Investigation

Page 1

IN RE:

JOPLIN CRITICAL INVESTIGATION

SWORN STATEMENT OF

LESLIE HAASE

Taken on Wednesday, November 20, 2013, from 4:24 p.m. to

5:20

p.m., at the law offices of Juddson H. McPherson, LLC, 626 S. Byers, in the City of Joplin, County of Jasper, State of Missouri, before SHARON K. ROGERS, C.C.R.650, a Certified Court Reporter and a Notary Public within and for the County of Jasper, and State of Missouri.

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Joplin Critical Investigation

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APPEARANCES

MR. THOMAS E. LORAINE Loraine & Associates, LLC 4075 Osage Beach Pkwy., Suite 300 Osage Beach, MO 65065

tellaw@loraineandassociates.com

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S T I P U L A T I O N

IT IS HEREBY STIPULATED AND AGREED that this Sworn Statement may be taken by steno-mask type recording by SHARON K. ROGERS, a Certified Court Reporter, and afterwards reduced into typewriting. It is further stipulated that the signature of the witness is hereby waived, and that said Sworn Statement of said witness shall be of the same force and effect as though said witness had read and signed Sworn Statement.

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Page 4 I N D E X Page/Line DIRECT EXAMINATION BY MR. LORAINE . . . 5-2

E X H I B I T S Exhibit #35 . . . . . . . 7-24 Lane Roberts pension Exhibit #36 . . . . . . . 9-4 Suite analysis Exhibit #37 . . . . . . . 10-14 6/13/13 building permit fee Exhibit #38 . . . . . . . 16-4 Spreadsheet for Firestone and Goodyear Exhibit #39 . . . . . . . 16-13

Goodyear tire notes Exhibit #40 . . . . . . . 18-23

Spreadsheet for Firestone and Goodyear Exhibit #41 . . . . . . . 22-11

Fire Station 2 storm water expenses

Note:

Exhibits in separate binder

(sic) - typed as spoken (ph.) - phonetic

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Page 5 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 Q. A. Q. A. A. Q. A. A. Q. LESLIE HAASE DIRECT EXAMINATION BY MR. LORAINE: Q. Ms. Haase, you're back to see me with a confidential envelope. Does it contain all

the items we talked about? It does. I can explain it to you. You can go

Let's take it open and see that. ahead and open that up.

You're still under

oath, you understand that? Yes, sir. Sir, Item 1 is the pension.

This involves Lane Roberts? Right, this is the missed pension deduction on the Chief. The amount yesterday is not And here is the

right, it was $35,000.00.

agreement that we entered into on August 28th. It says you will repay $337.30 a month

for 104 pay periods and that was signed by me and the Chief. Has that been accomplished? It has and here is the proof of that so these are all payrolls where we were taking it out. Is this extra copies for me? This is for you. And then he right here

wrote a check for $7,700.00 and this was the spreadsheet. Here's a copy of that check

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Page 6 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 A. A. Q. A. Q. Q. Q. A. that he wrote or where we posted the check. So what happened when we caught it what I did is calculate what it should have been and his normal amount, the reason it was so hard to catch it up, his normal pension amount at almost 20 percent was $638.93 so basically we just almost took about half of that so that's kind of how we landed on that amount. went ahead and brought -I want to see a checkstub. Is this one? Then I

No, this is just a copy from our tax receipts. My understanding is the checkstub on the bottom shows what the withdrawals are that the employee gets? Yes, well, -And this employee was aware that he had a pension plan? Yes. And did you deliver a copy of this Employment Repayment Agreement to his file for the personnel director? I assume that I did. ago. That was a long time

But, yeah, the City Attorney I assume -

I'm sure H.R. got a copy and we had a copy

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Page 7 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 A. Q. Q. A. Q. Q. A. A. Q. A. Q. for payroll. Do I look for that or are you certain? Well, this is it. I understand. What I'm asking is a copy of

this in Mr. Roberts' personnel file? You can double check. That would be my

normal course of action that I would do is give them a copy. That would be normal for you to do that? That would be my normal course. I assume

that I did it, but I can't swear that I did it. I mean I can't.

Now when you did this were you under any pressure from City Manager Rohr? I was not. I also brought you - we did an

annual audit and this is our management letter of things we did wrong and they did make note of that in that audit that year. Okay. Thank you. This is where you've got

an arrow? Yeah, so you can have all that. I'm going to call this Exhibit, they're premarked but we don't know what they are so we're making it #35. Now, ma'am, I've got

something marked now which is Exhibit #35.

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Page 8 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 Q. A. Q. A. Q. A. Q. A. Q. A. This is the stuff that you brought me for today consisting of 4 pages plus an audit report on Mr. Roberts' repayment of a pension issue? Yes, sir. And that's marked Exhibit #35? Yes, sir. Thank you, ma'am. What else do you have?

You asked me for the suite analysis on the Building Department issue, the money, the $150,000.00 missing money issue, so this is the report that HGE came out with and it's pretty self-explanatory as you read it. I

think I circled the ones that are the issues at the time. Page 2-2 is one circled? point those out for me. Yeah, there. 8-3, 8-9. And then what I did is brought you my analysis afterwards. Remember the City You might want to

Manager directed me to drill down into it and do some research and this is my notes about that. You called this document a Suite Analysis for

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Page 9 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 Q. A. A. Q. A. Q. A. A. Q. Community Development Land Management. that the right title to this? That is the right title. We're going to mark that #36. done? Yes. Now what is #36 exactly? That is if you'll recall what I said is the IS Director asked our software company, Sunguard HGE, to come in and basically just analyze the operations of the Billing Department and Code Enforcement, and this is their report. In this report is where they Has that been Is

pulled the open building permits and opening code enforcement cases and it details those dollar amounts. There was a deficiency initially in the paper of $150,000.00? No, their deficiency is more than that. was - I have those numbers circled. $213,155.00. That's on building permits? Building permits. These are permits that It's It

hadn't had any - they were still active, but hadn't had any activity in 6 months. That's

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Page 10 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 A. A. Q. A. Q. A. Q. Q. A. Q. A. Q. A. Q. a different issue. $229,589.00. This was not money missing? No. These were fees not collected? Yes. And part of the problem with this was because there was inadequate training on the forms? Yes, there were many different things detailed in my spreadsheet as to why the amount got down to this amount. Now I'm going to ask you in regards to #36 you gave me a one page analysis that's now marked #37. When did you prepare this? Code enforcement was

June 14th, 2013. Now the notes have 9 notes. This as to the

discrepancy that is noted in #36? Yes. Now as to the actual amount of fees that finally were determined to be outstanding and not collected, what was that sum? In building permits it was the $43,172.75. And that's as opposed to what was reported as $157,585.25? Right, which is different from this report

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Page 11 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 Q. A. Q. A. A. Q. A. Q. Q. A. Q. because that balance changes every day, so by the time I ran it this was the open amount. The $157,000.00 versus -The $213,000.00. The $213,000.00 that was reported in Exhibit #36? Right. This was in April, I think.

With that you're referring to Exhibit #36? Yes. Now this was building fee and code enforcement? No, this only analyzed building permits. Code enforcement we didn't really analyze. Those were just ones that never got sent to the Finance Department to be billed. I'm going to put a scratch through the code enforcement portion and I want you to put your initials by that scratch. Well, I say that. I made one note about code

enforcement that detailed the amount so this amount plus this would have been the $150,000.00. Okay. Circle Number 9 and go ahead and make

your notation there that you're putting your initials.

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Page 12 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 A. Q. A. Q. A. A. Q. Q. A. Q. A. (Witness complies) And what else? I'm just saying this is the code enforcement information. So this report does, in fact, then deal with building permits as well as code enforcement? Yes. All right. As I understand this was there

ever a retraction in the newspaper or anything that the problem reported was not, in fact, the numbers that we have analyzed? No, the numbers that were reported in the newspaper are these numbers, the $150,000.00. It wasn't the higher amount from this report. All right. And of that it boils down to

outstanding of $43,172.00? On building, and $110,000.00 on code enforcement. So I subtract the $43,000.00 from the $157,000.00 that gives me the amount outstanding? No, the $43,000.00 is the amount that was not billed. These are all errors that were shown

on the open report, ones that were voided and

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Page 13 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 A. Q. A. Q. A. Q. Q. A. reissued and they didn't know how to properly show the other ones as not open anymore, and then we had ones that were straight errors like I told you where they typed in the address and the amount so it made it a great big one, well, that would be that one. So

they were just ones as I went through them it was plain to see that they were errors and they did not know how to clean them up. So really the only issue is the $43,172.75? On the building permit side. We still had

the $110,000.00 on the code enforcement that was never billed. Now this report, was this ever given to the Personnel Director, was that Cody? his name? Steve Cope, yes. Yes, I was in the What's

interviews with Steve Cope and went over this information with Steve Cope. So is this the reason why he was let go or is there other reasons? Well, I -If you know. I can only give you my opinion on what I know. My opinion is that this was the last

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Page 14 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 Q. A. Q. A. straw on Mr. Cope. There had been many other

things, in fact, as I told you since then, which the media does not know, but since then we've found checks in his office, a stack of checks like this high (indicating), that were never deposited from maybe 2006 to 2009 or '10 that he just never deposited. sat on and never sent through to be deposited. Do you have any explanation for that? My only explanation would be you're not doing your job. All right. Now what else do we have? He just

Then you asked me to give you some information on the tires so I have some different things here. First of all we ran

you just a vendor activity listing for Firestone and Goodyear for different years, and it gives you a total. So for Firestone

this is 2013, and if you go to the bottom of it you can see that we spent almost $47,000.00 in 2013 so far with Firestone. 2012 we spent just over $38,000.00 with Firestone. $34,500.00. In 2011 we spent just under In 2010 with Firestone we spent In

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Page 15 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 Q. Q. A. almost $22,000.00. $19,500.00. And in 2009 we spent And

In 2008 we spent $9,052.00.

then we showed you Goodyear. $7,232.00 with Goodyear.

2013 we spent

2012 we spent just 2011, which

over $14,000.00 with Goodyear.

would be the year of the tornado, we spent $16,200.00. $19,500.00. Goodyear. 2010 with Goodyear we spent 2009 we spent $28,724.00 with 2008 we spent almost $22,500.00.

What's your conclusions? Well, you can clearly see that after the tornado we did more business with Firestone than we did Goodyear, but I have other information for you. We just did a breakdown

of the tire and alignment jobs completed by Firestone, Reeves, and Goodyear, and I believe this was we looked at 2010, '11, and '12. I think that might be useful. But,

also, when we discovered that the Police Department had stopped using Goodyear and was using Firestone we contacted Goodyear and these are the notes on that. I'm going to mark these separately. I'm

going to call this a spreadsheet, I don't know what else to call them, that details the

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Page 16 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 A. Q. A. Q. A. A. Q. A. Q. A. Q. A. Q. expenditures with Firestone and Goodyear since 2008 to the present time? Yes. That would be marked Exhibit #38, is that correct? Yes. And your conclusion is that Firestone has lost business? No, Goodyear has lost business. I mean Goodyear has lost business? Yes. That's Number #38. I'm going to now mark the

Goodyear notes Exhibit #39, and this was in some kind of notes in what file? This is where we were looking at the garage overall, the garage operations. We noticed

that the Police Department was not using Goodyear so we just called Goodyear to ask them why. And what did he say in this #39? manager of the Goodyear? Uh-huh. What did he say? The service manager at the 7th Street Goodyear said that he had done all the tire This is the

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Page 17 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 Q. Q. A. Q. A. balancing and alignments on our cars up until 2 to 3 years ago. He did not know why the He

garage stopped bringing in the cars.

indicated they used to have 3 to 4 cars every day in the shop from the City of Joplin and then one day it stopped with no explanation from the garage. Mr. Stevens said he assumed

Firestone was giving the City a better deal on tires and that the reason they were no longer getting the business per Mr. Stevens the garage did not request tires to carry out of the store and keep on hand at the garage. We were asking them several questions, but that's the pertinent part. What is your conclusion? Well, I mean Mr. Rohr told me. To stop using? Well, he told me right after the tornado to stop using them, but also as a result of this he told me, because I hadn't because I had forgotten the other, I said, well, we stopped using Goodyear and we're using Firestone and he very clearly said, well, that was because of me. Because of Mr. Rohr?

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Page 18 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 A. A. Q. Q. A. A. Q. A. Q. A. Q. Yes. So Mr. Rohr has confused business with personal matters, is that true? conclusion we can make from this? I believe so. And to the extent that it's cost Goodyear money, quite a bit of money, is that right? Yes. And the reason that was stopped was because Mr. Rohr was not satisfied with an answer one of the people at Goodyear gave him to give him some kind of special treatment as to fixing his tires, is that right? All he said to me right after the tornado is we're not going to do business with Goodyear because they did not fix my tires. All right. And that's what this conclusion Is that a

is about here? Yes. Now this tire alignment, what is the dollar amount involved? You've got a number of

pages on this spreadsheet and we'll mark it as Exhibit #40, and if you will give me an analysis of what this says? Basically this is just telling you all of the

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Page 19 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 Q. A. A. A. Q. A. Q. Q. jobs from November 1st, 2010 through May 31st, 2013 of the tire and alignment jobs completed by Firestone, Reeves, and Goodyear. Basically we were doing a different project. We were looking at how many tires were being used so that's all that this is. It doesn't help us in any other way other than the fact that this is a background as to the kind of business they were getting before? Yes. And they were getting substantial business and then it went to nothing for Goodyear? Yes, for the Police Department, yes. Of the Police Department. And the Police

Department is under Lane Roberts' control, which is directly under City Manager Rohr, right? Yes, although the Police Department does not buy the tires directly themselves. They go

through the central garage which is under Public Works, was under Public Works at that time. Which is now under Mr. Rohr? Yes.

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Page 20 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 A. Q. A. A. Q. A. Q. Q. A. Q. A. Q. And that was a change? Yes, sir. And who was it under before? The Public Works, David Hertzberg. So your conclusion is that Mr. Hertzberg might not have been able to be directed the way Rohr wanted him to be, but now it's in a different department where it can be directed the way he wanted it to be. correct statement? that's valid? No, I can't make that conclusion. But nevertheless that's the result is less business because Mr. Rohr has said that? Yes. Okay. me? You asked me to look into the storm water at Fire Station 2, so I have a report for you that shows the expenses that come out of the storm water, they're the highlighted ones, and the total is $118,527.00. That was consistent with what I had talked with you about. I found out I talked to our engineer that Now, Leslie, what else did you give Is that a

Is that a conclusion

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Page 21 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 Q. A. Q. A. Q. A. handles our storm water -Who is that? Dan Johnson. And I have more information

about what transpired. Give me some more information. So when we started working on the plans for, and this is all according to Dan Johnson, when we started working on the plans for the fire station Dan and Jack Schaller and Mitch, they were all meeting and discussing the plans and the design and the storm water subject came up and Dan said, well, what we need to do is we need to make the channel wider and we need to let the flow of the water go through the ditch and we need to concrete it, so that was his solution. And

what he told me is that Mitch and Jack both said, well, Mitch said the City Manager will not like that. That won't fly with the City

Manager, and Jack said, yeah, that won't fly with the City Manager. So Dan said, well,

this is the most cost effective way to do this to get the water flowing. His proposal? Right.

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Page 22 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 A. A. Q. Q. A. Q. Q. A. Which is the open storm sewer? Right. So Mitch, according to Dan, Mitch and

Jack agreed to go meet with the City Manager and talk to him about what he wanted to do and they came back and told Dan. Now Dan was

not at that meeting, but they came back and told Dan that the City Manager did not want to do the open ditch, he wanted to do a box culvert. And that way cost the City the yellow things that you've underlined on Exhibit #41 which amounts to $118,527.45? Yes. Now he did not tell me how much the

open ditch would have been, but he said this was considerably more expensive. Yes. So the question I have is on Station

No. 2 concerning this box culvert and all the expenses around that which includes rental of equipment, too, doesn't it to handle it, -Uh-huh. -- so those numbers amount to $118,527.00. How did that square away with the budget item for this particular station? absorbed by that budget? Well, we did not include this work to be - we How was that

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Page 23 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 A. Q. didn't include this in the fire station rebuild, so like I said they came to me, Mitch and Jack came to me and all they said to me was, you know, we've got extra expenses on storm water that we didn't anticipate, you know, what's your suggestion for paying for this. And I told them, you know, well, this

would be an appropriate expense from the annual maintenance on a storm water. I did

not know anything about the box culvert. So you were duped to the extent that you didn't have all the information? right? The problem that I have is I don't know if when they came to me if they were only talking about the widening at the channel or if they already knew about the box culvert. I really don't know. And the thing is that, Is that

you know, department heads come to me all day long every day saying, well, we don't have money for this, where can we find money for this, and this is what I do all day long. And I can't honestly - I just don't remember them telling me that we needed a box culvert or that we were going to - all I remember is

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Page 24 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 A. Q. A. A. Q. A. Q. Q. A. Q. that they said we need some extra money for storm water and I said, okay, well, you know, we'll have to use storm water funds and it's an appropriate use, it's not out of line, but that's really all I remember. But what I'm hearing you tell me is Exhibit #41 shows that it's not an appropriate use the way it was done? Well, after talking to Dan I mean he said that we could have done it by the open channel, you know, in a cheaper fashion. Well, save $118,000.00, right, less what the open channel would be? Right. I think he told me something like 20 or 25. He did not tell me. Well, the fact remains that as this Exhibit #41 would show that station is at least out of budget by the number of $118,527.45 that was not reported against that budget, isn't' that true? That would be true. And the City Council doesn't know that? I guess that's true. I mean as far as I know

they did not take a green sheet for that.

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Page 25 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 A. Q. A. Q. A. A. Q. Q. A. Q. A. Q. What is a green sheet? A Council bill. Okay. Now do you have specific knowledge -

I've been told that the City Manager directed this transfer to be made. Do you know that

for sure or do you not know that for sure or do you just not understand, do you not know? I understand he never directed that of me. As far as I know they came to me and they said, hey, where we can get this money and I said use storm water. somebody it was not me. Okay. So if he told that to someone else the If he directed

City Manager did not tell that to you? He did not. And if you would have known all the conclusions that we've got on Exhibit #41 here you would not have done it that way? I would have certainly had a conversation with him. With the Manager? Yes. And with the Council, if it was necessary? It's over $90,000.00. Yeah, I don't - if there had been a

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Page 26 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 A. Q. A. A. Q. Q. A. Q. conversation with Council that would have been his responsibility, not mine. Mr. Manager? Yes. I appreciate your efforts and #41 really tells us that if an auditor was coming along he would not know, he or she would not know that the station could have been built $118,527.45 cheaper less from that sum whatever the open storm sewer would have been, is that true? Yes. And they also wouldn't know that this $118,000.00 was taken from some other source? I mean they wouldn't be able to follow that trail, that paper trail? No, they would because we say on here it's for the fire station and they pull these reports and they look at this stuff, so they would be able to see that we spent storm water at Fire Station 2. Okay. But the Council wouldn't know that

unless they asked the auditor to specifically find that? Yes.

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Page 27 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 A. A. Q. A. Q. Q. Now I'm going to ask a question about that, Leslie. There have been some conferences or

discussions that there is no auditing of these various special accounts. That's not true. Okay. Tell me about that.

Well, what special accounts? Well, special tax accounts like the storm water sewer. Yes, there is. things. There's actually several

First of all on the two taxes that

we have that are specifically - well, actually three taxes that are specifically for projects we have a list of projects that we're supposed to do. Now annual maintenance

is in there and that covers a variety of things. projects. That's what we use to do our small The projects that are named are

usually large projects, but we always use annual maintenance because we always have small projects that come up that we need to do. So there's a list that goes to the

voters, I mean the voters see it, it's not part of the ballot, but the voters see it and they know that's what they're approving and

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Page 28 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 Q. A. Q. A. Q. A. my job is to make sure that's what that money is being spent on. And then to ensure that

I'm doing my job we have an oversight committee that was appointed by the Council that we have to give reports to to see how we're spending this money. Who is the oversight committee? It's a group of like 11 citizens. Who are they appointed by? The Council. So like that meeting is It's a quarterly meeting,

actually tomorrow.

we meet tomorrow at 4:00 o'clock and we go through - so we have a list of the projects and then we show what the original estimated cost was and we show what we spent, and then that report goes to Council, also. And so we

have that first of all which is an extra layer and they're looking at those three taxes and how we're spending that money, and then on top of that we have our annual audit where the auditors are looking at things. What special accounts do you have? We have five taxes. We have our 1 percent

general sales tax, we have another half cent general sales tax that's actually for Public

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Page 29 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 A. Q. Q. Q. A. Q. A. Q. A. Q. A. Safety. That's one of the special ones I

guess you would call it. Will that sunset? That one does not sunset. We have our half

cent transportation sales tax which also does not sunset. Then we have two that sunset,

that would be our parks storm warm sales tax, and then our capital improvement sales tax. When do those last two sunset? The one just sunset in - it was going to sunset I think in 2012 and we voted, the voters approved its renewal in 2011 right after the tornado. For how long? For another ten years. And then the CIP one We're

will expire January 1st of 2015.

hoping to have that election next August. If that doesn't pass? We will be severely hampered in the street projects that we can do. Is there an issue with spending? I mean

should we be relying on these special taxes for spending? Well, Joplin -Other than capital projects. I mean capital

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Page 30 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 A. A. Q. A. Q. A. Q. A. Q. Q. A. projects would seem to me that's what they're designed for, a special tax. And that's what we spend those on. It's just

annual maintenance in included in there in all of them. So say, for example, these funds that were used on this fire station here on Exhibit #41, they were taken out of the sewer fund? No, out of the storm water sales tax. The storm water tax. project? Yes. Was that capital project for the building of Station No. 2? What? What you're showing me on #41 here is additional costs for the building of Station No. 2? That is correct. Would this be a proper category for that budget item to be assessed the way it was assessed against the storm water? Yes, I would not have said that if it was not a proper expense from the storm water sales tax. It is a storm water project. Now the No would be the answer? So that's a capital

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Page 31 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 Q. A. A. Q. A. Q. A. A. Q. A. Q. Q. A. Q. question is to me, was it appropriate to use a box culvert when it could have been accomplished in a more efficient way, but it's absolutely an appropriate expense from storm water. Because it's a storm water issue? Yes, because it's a storm water issue. It's just a question of should it have been done cheaper? Yes. And the answer generally would be yes according to City practices? Yes. Let me ask you this question. In fact, if

the City used the Public Works Department to build this, -Uh-huh, we do that all the time. -- which they did, they would save money? Right, we do that all the time. And that's appropriate? Yes, because we're saving taxpayer money by doing it in house we can always do it cheaper. Because a contract bid is going to be more? Yes, it's just we usually don't have a lot of

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Page 32 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 Q. Q. A. Q. A. Q. A. Q. Q. staff. That tax hired four people the first

time around and those four people, one of their duties is to clean the ditches, to clean the leaves out of the ditches, so when they're not doing that then they have some time to do some of the smaller projects. Okay. Leslie, has anyone contacted you about

you being with me? No, sir. So you've not had any problems? No, sir. You will tell me if you do? Yes, sir. Is there anything else we need to talk about? A. No, I think that's it. I appreciate your

Thank you for your time.

expertise and I think we've finally gotten to the bottom of this. (Short break taken 4:58 to 5:11 p.m., back on record) (By Mr. Loraine) Before I let you go I've

been asked by some of the people I've interviewed why the Mayor has changed her vote when it came time for City Manager Rohr's vote to ask him to leave, and I'm

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Page 33 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 A. Q. A. Q. presuming he leaves without cause and he gets paid whatever he's got coming, that's my presumption, but if it's for cause I guess he doesn't get paid. But as far as I'm

concerned the vote that was taken was really without cause and he would have gotten paid. So the question has been asked by several, probably four or five people, why did the Mayor change her vote, and I've been given some reasons for that and I want to know if there's any financial reason that you know of since you write the checks. And one of the

things I've been told is that she has a loan from the Chamber of Commerce/City funds, and I don't believe that's true, but I wanted to correctly find out what your information is on that. that? She has no loan from the City of Joplin. Okay. She does have a loan on a business. I Do you have any information on

assume City Manager Rohr or the City of Joplin has no control over that. be your understanding? Yes, that would be my understanding. Because you don't know of any such? That would

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Page 34 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 Q. A. A. A. Q. A. Q. Right. Do you know of any other reasons why City Manager Rohr would possibly have some information against the Mayor that he could use as leverage in the way of expenditures? Do you know of any other issue that might shed light on that? I do. This would be from your understanding of the financial information? Right, this would be something that came through my office. Okay. What is it?

We received a check request from the City Clerk's office to pay a bill, my best recollection is over $600.00, to Charlie's Chicken for a dinner for the funeral of one of the Mayor's relatives that died recently. That check request was brought to me and I went to the City Clerk's office and said what is this? We don't do this. And they informed

me that - now it is common for us - we've had other Council members family pass away and we do a little bit of something, maybe $100.00 or $200.00 worth, but nothing to this

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Page 35 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 A. Q. A. A. Q. A. Q. Q. A. Q. A. Q. magnitude. And whenever this happened the

City Clerk was out and the Mayor called the Assistant City Clerk and directed her to order this dinner for her family. Who is the Assistant City Clerk? Barb Gollhofer. She works under? Barb Hogelin. Hogelin, okay. So to some extent the Mayor Barbara Gollhofer.

took a little bit of liberty, shall we say, with the amount that might be donated towards the relative's death, dinner for the guests? Yes. And you would criticize the $400.00 sum? would criticize the whole $600.00, -Yes. -- but you could understand there's precedent in your business for some kind of gift? Yes. Does the City Manager know that? Yes, so my protocol is to inform both the City Attorney and the City Manager, and I did, and the City Manager took it up to the best of my knowledge with the Mayor Pro Tem, Bill Scearce, and I believe some co-Council You

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Page 36 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 A. Q. A. Q. A. A. Q. Q. members, I don't know which ones, paid a portion of the bill and then the City paid a smaller portion. So Bill Scearce and the City Manager were aware of that issue? Yes. Since it was repaid to the City do you see anything illegal or unethical as a result of the repayment? Well, they didn't repay it. the bill. We never paid

They sent it through and we did

not process it so they just paid their part directly. So, no, there's nothing in the end

that wound up being inappropriate on the City's part. But that is at least an issue that financially you have observed? Yes. Is there any other issues? Yes, there are other issues, the Mayor's travel, there are from time to time issues with the Mayor's travel with some inappropriate expenses or expenses that are not accurately accounted for. I mean we There

don't get receipts if we need them.

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Page 37 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 A. Q. A. Q. have been things with travel that I have had to report to the City Manager in the past and the City pays the appropriate amount, but I have had to report things to the City Manager. So in other words there's been some issues in the past on the Mayor's travel that may be questionable that the City Manager has asked you to pay it and he has taken the responsibility for there being no receipts? No, the City Manager didn't ask us to pay it, because we're not going to pay it through the Finance Department he has to let the Mayor know that we're not going to do that. The

Council kind of adopted that policy that if there's an issue with Council's travel reimbursement the City Manager is to notify the Mayor and then if the Council member still doesn't agree with it they can take it with the whole City Council group. In this case the Mayor was the person in question so who does the Mayor consult with? I think the Manager talked to the Mayor in these cases. We did not pay anything inappropriate, but he does have records of

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Page 38 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 A. Q. A. A. Q. A. Q. A. Q. A. Q. A. Q. Q. A. Q. requests. Of her requests for payment? Yes. Would you tell me how much that might be in question? I don't know because it's -Would it be more than $100.00? It would be more than $100.00. Would it be more than $1,000.00? It's possible. Probably not more than $5,000.00? No. So at least there would be some appearance of possibly a submission of cost without receipts? Yes. Now you know about that and the City Manager knows about that. about that? I don't know. the Manager. Anything else that you can recall that might be out of the usual that might give the City Manager some control over the Mayor? I think that's all I can think of. It's my job to report it to Does the Council know

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Joplin Critical Investigation

Page 39 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 (SWORN STATEMENT CONCLUDED) A. Q. A. Q. Okay. I thank you for your honesty. I

understand the problems.

I'd like you to

keep what we say in this room and I ask you once again that if you have any retaliation or problems with anyone in complying with my questions I'd want you to notify me immediately, okay? Yes, sir. Thank you very much for your help. Thank you. Is that understood?

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Page 40

REPORTER'S CERTIFICATE

STATE OF MISSOURI ss. COUNTY OF JASPER I, SHARON K. ROGERS, Certified Court Reporter in the State of Missouri, do certify that pursuant to the foregoing Stipulation the witness came before me on the 20th day of November, 2013, was duly sworn by me, and was examined. That examination was then taken by me by

steno-mask recording and afterwards transcribed; said Sworn Statement is subscribed by the witness as hereinbefore set out on the day in that behalf aforesaid and is herewith returned. I further certify that I am not counsel, attorney, or relative of either party, or clerk, or stenographer of either party or of the attorney of either party, or otherwise interested in the event of this suit.

__________________________ SHARON K. ROGERS, CCR-650

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