Shelby County – HR Policy Reverses Centralized Tracking Of Sick, Vacation Time

Shelby Co., Ill. (ECWd) –

We recently exposed payroll records for the Health Department that indicated a person was working when in reality they were on vacation.  Those records are not true and accurate.  Full article at this link.

The backstop to identify this type of payroll misrepresentation was tracking these centralized in one office, which at the time was the Treasurer’s office.  That process was put in place with this HR policy in 2019 and specifically assigned the duties of tracking payroll sick time, vacation time, and other benefit time to one office.

The Shelby County Board adopted a new HR policy last week that reverses standard practices that were put in place years ago at the advice of auditors as it relates to tracking sick time and vacation time.

Now, tracking sick and vacation time is the responsibility of the department head.  So, what does that mean?  It means everything related to sick time and vacation time has been decentralized to department heads.  The county clerk who is now handling payroll has no way to know if that information is accurate or not.  This will result in payroll being issued solely on what a department head submits.  In other words, the checks and balances of the system have been removed.  Most competent auditors would see this as an area for potential fraud.  Considering the health department claimed people were working when they were really on vacation, makes it a perfect example of the potential problems such a policy creates.

Members of the new county board were crystal clear when they voiced their opinions during public comment prior to their election. They stated numerous times they were going to reverse things, and it appears this is just one of those on their hit list.

Stay tuned for the Dive Team Forensic Audit outrage update.