(Nicole Reis/meadowlakeNOW Staff)

By Nicole Reis

Facility fundraising

Improper accounting not fraud caused missing fund fears at Northwest Community Lodge Association

Feb 28, 2020 | 5:15 PM

Members of the Northwest Community Lodge Association (NCLA) can breathe a sigh of relief as their fundraising books have finally been balanced.

Geoff Barton, former association chairman says NCLA performed an internal audit after some board members suspected some of their fundraising dollars may have been stolen.

“Rumors were started about potential nefarious activity happening within the committee. We’re in our infancy so the totals we thought we raised…it was bad math really,” Barton said. “We weren’t doing the math right and the communication between us and Saskatchewan Health Authority (SHA) as far as how much was collected, was not clear.”

The 2019 provincial budget included a $12 million commitment to a brand new 72-bed long-term care facility for Meadow Lake. The NCLA was formed in 2015 by a former employee at the Northland Pioneers Lodge.

Barton explained the NCLA was collecting donated money for fixtures and equipment for the new facility. He said larger donations are being held in trust by SHA. Some donations were accounted for twice and SHA has trust accounts set aside for the facility’s building.

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The association assumed all funds raised were for fixtures and equipment when in fact, a portion of funds were appropriated for building costs.

“We had been erroneously reporting, the funds raised weren’t actually for us anyway,” Barton said. “Until we actually sat down and went through everything which was when we discovered what we did have. What we actually had was significantly less than what we thought we had.”

The association said they could not proceed with fundraising without the accuracy of an external audit process despite having their own accountant. Grant Thornton LLP of Saskatoon performed the audit who determined there was no misuse of funds, according to Barton.

“I guess some people thought there was somebody dipping their hands in, but we haven’t found anything that suggests that was the case, not to point a finger, but that goes to anyone who was on the board,” he said. “We couldnt find any areas where money could have been taken out.”

Over one year ago, the board went with an outside firm to ensure accounting practices met industry standards.

“According to the accountant, everything is in order. We got signing authority that there wasn’t a lot of opportunity for anything to go missing,” he said.

NCLA said they now have real time book keeping and reporting to prevent any further confusion.

“Books are a little bit tidier as far as what we do have,” he said.

NCLA treasurer, Crystal Murray was contacted for comment she but did not respond before our publication deadline.

SHA spokesperson Lisa Thompson was asked to verify Barton’s claims and the dollar amount held in trust for building materials though was unable to provide comment prior to deadline.

Barton’s chairperson role expired on Feb. 24 and he said he will not be running for NCLA again.

There are now vacant positions with NCLA to continue longterm care fundraising efforts.

The NCLA can be contacted here.

The organization was not able to determine the dollar figure they assumed to have prior to the internal audit.

Barton said the organization has approximately $600,000 held in trust. NCLA needs a total of $2.5 million for fixtures and equipment for the new long term care facility slated to break ground this spring.

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nicole.reis@jpbg.ca

Twitter: @nicolereis7722