Audit: City Of Compton Overspent By $16M Since 2008
COMPTON (CBSLA) — A state audit has found that Compton has been overspending by more than $16 million a year for the past 10 years.
The city of Compton has not always had a deficit, which now adds up to more than $42 million, according to a review published by state Controller Betty T. Yee. At the start of the 2007-08 fiscal year, Compton had a general fund surplus of $22.4 million.
Three years later, that surplus turned into a $42.7 million deficit due to overspending at an average of $16.3 million a year above budgeted expenditures, according to Yee.
The Compton City Council adopted a repayment plan in June 2014, but over the next year, the deficit increased by another $6.4 million, the controller said.
"While violating the city's charter and continually overpaying themselves, the city council's brazen overspending contributed to the city's financial hardship," Yee said. "Clearly, the city council needs to right the ship and make deficit spending a part of its past by exercising meaningful oversight of the city's duties."
Yee said Compton's City Council expenditures are three times those of comparable charter cities in Los Angeles County. Where other small cities have one full-time assistant for an entire council, Compton -- which has a population of under 100,000 -- has one for each of its five council members.
The audit determined that total compensation for the mayor and city council members themselves exceeded limits in Compton's city charter by nearly $1.3 million from January 2010 through July 2017. The review also found that all charges to city-issued credit cards were questionable, because city management did not enforce its policies and procedures.
Compton Mayor Aja Brown said the city "is on a firm and definitive path to recovery, which includes a new solid source of annual tax revenue, new economic development, new fiscal policies, stable senior management and full City Council support."
(© Copyright 2018 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. City News Service contributed to this report.)
