Yes, mistakes were made.
On all sides.
In what has rapidly become a major, overnight crisis the story of a clerical mistake by the County Assessor’s office and of funding Armageddon by the superintendent of Cache Public Schools has left public officials, the media and the public at large all scratching their heads. It also raises several questions.
Here’s what we know so far:
In March of 2021, Goodyear – Cache’s largest employer – provided several sets of valuation numbers of the Accessor’s office. During the process of entering that data an employee made an error. That error, however, proved costly and resulted in a decrease of $3,334,588 in tax revenue.
The error went unnoticed by all parties involved – including the school system.
About a year later, on June 22, Goodyear’s accounting firm became aware of the problem and brought it to the attention of the Accessors office. County Assessor Grant Edwards and his team began reviewing the problem and, in July, notified the school district.
At the same time this was going on the Oklahoma Tax Commission and Goodyear began going back and forth over three of Goodyear’s exemptions that the Tax Commission did not allow.
This issue over the tax exemptions was not related to the error in the Accessor’s office but it, too, would have a financial impact on the Cache School District.
Over the past year the Accessor’s office, according to Edwards, communicated with the Tax Commission about “removing and reinstating Goodyear’s exemptions but nothing about the evaluation was discussed.”
Which means the Tax Commission, like the Accessor’s office, was also unaware of the valuation problem until it raised by Goodyear’s accounting firm.
Then, about two weeks ago, Cache school officials said they began working to better understand the problem. This past week, Cache Superintendent Chad Hance posted a heavy-handed response to the situation painting a dire financial picture for the school and writing as if the Accessor’s office was being less than open with school officials and the general public.
However, Hance’s letter didn’t mention the problems with Goodyear’s tax emptions; problems that also affect the district’s funding levels.
Further, Hance’s statement was also silent on the fact that school officials, during a special meeting in July – after being notified of the potential financial problems the district could face – voted to continue with the sale of millions of dollars in school bonds that had been approved by voters in February.
Because school officials had already begun construction on the middle school project they boxed themselves into a corner – as it is right now, the school can’t be used without finishing construction.
Yet Hance failed to communicate these additional problems to school patrons and the public.
While we understand the need for up-to-date school facilities and infrastructure, it doesn’t seem prudent to continue with a big bonding project, knowing that, in the future, the district could face deeper financial issues.
We believe the need for transparency should apply to all parties.
Mistakes will happen and problems will occur, and we encourage Hance and others to work with the Accessor’s office to solve problems instead of pointing fingers. We applaud both sides for acknowledging the problem and working to find solutions.
But we would also suggest that the Cache School District, knowing that it faces new funding challenges, reevaluate its spending priorities and, in the future, do a better job presenting all the facts to the general public before it attempts to levy blame.