I had been getting some calls that what was holding up the $20 million Kroll report wasn’t Kroll, but the mayor. That is, despite the mayor’s recent indignant demands of Kroll, it wasn’t that firm’s fault necessarily that the report was being delayed.
The tip was that something was sitting in the mayor’s office waiting for a response and the mayor didn’t want to respond so he came out punching Kroll instead. The implication being, of course, that the mayor was trying to cut something short.
Nonsense, said Fred Sainz, spokesman for the mayor.
And then he gave me a scooplet (for a pension explainer click here):
There are two nuances holding up the $80,000-plus-per-page report, Sainz said.
- The Booking of the Corbett Lawsuit Settlement
Kroll, Sainz said, can’t figure out how to bridge a discrepancy between the way the city understands the liabilities attached to the so-called Corbett pension settlement. The 2000 Corbett settlement boosted employee pensions but the retirement system still thinks of that boost as a contingent liability – meaning it’s a liability that may not need to be paid. The city, correctly, thinks of it as a real liability that will always have to be paid. Kroll is confused. - Outstanding Allegations About Service Level Agreements
No way I have enough energy to explain this one right now. But I’ll give a rough one. Everyone knows that the city has, perhaps illegally, transferred money from its water and sewer funds to its general fund to make up for bad budgeting and lack of money.
Well, there was a letter sent about this practice from a former city attorney named Bill Newsome. The mayor has announced an audit of the funds involved but Kroll apparently wants more.
That’s it. Sainz says these two excuses for the delay are “total red herrings.”