Ohio University is investigating a department in the Russ College of Engineering and Technology for $70,000 of missing money, but a suspect has yet to be named.
People are still trying to figure out what happened
said John Burns, director of legal affairs.
Burns said he preferred to not call the situation theft yet, instead referring to the $70,000 as missing. However, Burns said that it is pretty clear the investigation is focusing on the Department of Industrial and Manufacturing Systems Engineering, and the money was probably misplaced using a university P-card.
P-cards, or purchasing cards, are basically credit cards for faculty to use for university-related purposes. Two former employees in the IMSE department have a history of not updating P-card transactions on time and making major mistakes in the accounting of the P-cards, but sources say these incidents with the employees and the missing money should not be connected.
Charles Parks, former chair of the IMSE department, had his P-card placed on hold on March 10, 2004, citing poor record keeping practices missing and insufficient receipts and failure to meet reporting requirements ... But because Parks had made no improvement in responsibly using his P-card, on April 25, Payment Services closed his P-card after he had been on probation for numerous violations in the past, according to documents obtained by The Post. Before the investigation of the department began at the end of Spring Quarter, Parks resigned at the end of Winter Quarter, citing his wish to teach full time and to direct and expand the off-campus Masters of Science program. Before his resignation after about 14 years as chair, he received poor faculty reviews, one in 2003, because of his lack of active involvement in some of his classes and not providing financial information about the department to faculty.
Another employee, Kylie Collins, was fired in September because of mistakes in handling the accounting of P-cards, Burns said. Her P-card was also closed before she lost her job.
In August, Dennis Irwin, dean of the College of Engineering, removed Parks as director of the Engineering Management program, stating Parks never was formally appointed as director of the program, and he had little confidence in Parks' ability to direct the program based on his financial failures as chair of IMSE.
Parks' lawyer, K. Robert Toy, filed a grievance on Aug. 19 because of Parks' termination as director, which Irwin responded to Sept. 27. In Irwin's letter to Parks, Irwin wrote: Since fiscal year 2001 IMSE's general fund accounts have ended the fiscal year in deficit. Your approach to these deficits has been to transfer funds from research incentive accounts
notably
that of the Center for Advanced Software Systems Integration (CASSI) in order to avoid contributing to a potential collegewide general funds deficit (such deficit never having occurred during my tenure as dean or that of any of my predecessors). However, Irwin said Parks' failure to manage funds properly and the missing $70,000 are being tied together inappropriately. I think that unfortunately two separate issues and two separate people are being connected in an unfortunate way
Irwin said. (Parks) resigned before anyone knew about the criminal matter. So it's really independent ... some articles that I've seen and statements by people that I've heard attempt to tie them together ... The fact that there were deficits in the department had something to do with my decision to talk with him about that. That was before I knew there was any criminal activity.
Several calls by The Post to Parks' attorney, K. Robert Toy, were never returned. The Post also made a call to Collins' attorney, Claire M. Ball, which was not returned by the time of publication.
However, according to documents obtained by The Post, Toy said it is not Parks' responsibility, financially or otherwise, to supervise Collins, whom Toy alleges having stolen the money in the letter. Toy states Parks' termination was a result of age discrimination.
But, Collins is not a suspect in the case, Burns said. And, in a letter back to Toy, Burns states his allegations of Collins are extremely inaccurate.
Investigator Don Combs from the Ohio University Police Department said he could not comment because the investigation is still open.
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Michelle Simakis
