Detailed receipts for restaurant meals and other expenses charged on credit cards by employees at the Chattanooga Convention and Visitors Bureau went missing 36 percent of the time from July 2015 through June 2016, a recent state audit found.
Tennessee state Sen. Todd Gardenhire has a response to that: Make bureau employees who lost receipts repay the expenses – out of their own pockets.
“If the people at the CVB can’t produce those receipts showing who they went to lunch with and what the purpose was, then, in my opinion, they owe that money back to the taxpayers,” Gardenhire said.
Gardenhire’s comments come as the tourism bureau turns the page on the Bob Doak era.
The bureau has launched a search for a new president and CEO to replace Doak, who spent 15 years at the organization’s helm. It has hired a new Chattanooga firm to audit its operations, Henderson Hutcherson and McCullough, replacing Wilkins, Crews & Associates P.C.
But according to former Chattanooga Mayor Jon Kinsey, who’s on the CVB board and is part of the search committee for Doak’s replacement, those changes don’t have to do with questions that were raised this year over the bureau’s spending on meals, travel and entertainment. Gardenhire wrote legislation that triggered the state audit, and Hamilton County Commissioner Tim Boyd has repeatedly questioned bureau practices.
“The CVB is on a high note. We just had the governor, Sen. [Bob] Corker, and the mayor brag about what a great job we’re doing,” said Kinsey, referring to some of the elected officials who praised the Convention and Visitors Bureau and Doak in September at the organization’s annual luncheon for accomplishments such as Hamilton County’s reported $1.06 billion in tourism impact – just ahead of Knox County’s reported $1.056 billion.
Bob Doak, CVB President and CEO, delivers the State of the Tourism Industry address during the 76th annual Meeting and Luncheon of the Chattanooga Convention and Visitors Bureau at the Chattanooga Convention Center Wednesday, Sept. 20, 2017, in Chattanooga, Tenn. Doak will be retiring in February.Kinsey said he’s new to the bureau’s board, and the organization now requires detailed receipts.
“There [previously] were very detailed descriptions of every expenditure. For example, if there was a lunch at Bluewater [Grille], there was a description of who was there at lunch and what was the purpose,” he said.
But employees should have kept the receipts from restaurants that showed what was ordered, Kinsey said.
“They should have had that – no question. Yeah, they should have had that receipt,” he said.
The state audit said that CVB employees spent $48,537 on meals and entertainment for out-of-town clients during the audit period, along with $14,163 for business lunches and other dining that involved only Chattanooga-area residents.
Gardenhire, a retired senior vice president of wealth management at Morgan Stanley Smith Barney, said that if the IRS audited the bureau, it would require detailed receipts if the organization was going to claim those expenses as deductions.
He said that in private business, if you can’t produce the receipt for an expense, it comes out of your own pocket.
“No pun intended, you have to eat it,” Gardenhire said.
Kinsey said the IRS doesn’t require detailed receipts – though the visitors bureau does require them, now.
As for switching to a new auditor, that’s not unusual, he said.
“That is very standard to change auditing firms periodically,” Kinsey said. “The [former] auditors did a great job.”
The committee that’s searching for a new Convention and Visitors Bureau CEO and president will accept applications until Nov. 13. The bureau’s’s new leader is expected to be in place by Feb. 1., and the board asked Doak to extend his employment until February 2018 to assist in the leadership transition.
“I think we’ll get a lot of in-town and out-of-town [applicants],” Kinsey said. “Chattanooga’s a hot place, and it’s a very attractive position.”
The bureau’s search committee is comprised of executive committee members – Kinsey, Tom Cupo, Mitch Patel, Keith Sanford, Ken DeFoor and Lisa Maragnano – as well as community members Hodgen Mainda, Kim White and Tom Griscom.
Contact staff writer Tim Omarzu at tomarzu@timesfreepress.com, www.facebook.com/MeetsForBusiness, on Twitter @meetforbusiness or 423-757-6651.