by Mike Sharkey
Staff Writer
The long-awaited audit of the property appraiser’s office is scheduled to begin today.
For the past several weeks, City Council auditor Bob Johnson has been negotiating with Property Appraiser Ernie Mastroianni over several facets of the audit, which Mayor John Delaney has been requesting for months. Johnson said much of the perceived animosity between Mastroianni’s office and Delaney the past several months is because Delaney’s desire for the audit and Mastroianni’s refusal have been negotiated through the media.
“I think it was just a matter of conversations over time,” said Johnson of Mastroianni, who returned to work on a full-time basis today after quadruple by-pass surgery last December, and finally allowed the audit. “Some of the documents are confidential and we will protect that. We will make sure we are not in violation of the law. We’re not going in there on a witch hunt.”
Mastroianni did not return phones calls seeking comment.
Delaney has been pursuing an audit of Mastroianni’s office for almost a year. Mastroianni, in turn, has repeatedly denied the audit, stating that, while he’s a constitutional officer in Duval County, he’s fiscally responsible to the state’s Department of Revenue.
“We are very pleased the Council auditor is undertaking an audit of an important City agency. We look forward to reviewing the results,” said Audrey Moran, Delaney’s chief of staff. “My understanding is that it will be a complete and thorough audit of taxpayer dollars.”
Johnson said the month-long audit will be conducted by three members of his office and with the full cooperation of Mastroianni, who’s been in office for almost 16 years, and his staff. He also said a full audit of the office is long overdue.
“There hasn’t been an audit in a long time,” said Johnson. “We’ve done them in phases — petty cash, budgets and quarterly reports — but this is the first time in some time that we’ve done an in-depth audit. We have haven’t done one since Ernie’s been there.”
According to Johnson, he wrote Mastroianni several weeks ago and established the groundwork for the audit. Mastroianni responded and, after several personal meetings, Mastroianni relented — with conditions.
“He set the stage and he agreed to set aside space for us,” said Johnson. “We mentioned Monday [today] in the letter and he agreed. He set the ground rules and he’s invited us over.”
Johnson said once the audit is complete, they will sit down with Mastroianni and go over it, line by line. Mastroianni will have the right to dispute, first verbally then in writing, any discrepancies.
“If we find anything questionable, we will go to their staff and try and clear it up,” explained Johnson. “If they can’t clear it up, we’ll make it as note in a draft of our report. Once we get a first draft, we’ll sit down them, go over it and give them an opportunity to prove us wrong.
“He [Mastroianni] has the opportunity to attach anything he wants to our report. The reader will have an opportunity to see our side and his side. When we are finished, we will release the report as a public record.
“The report goes to City Council and I’ll send a copy, as a courtesy, to the Department of Revenue and the mayor’s office.”