good afternoon and welcome everyone i mean reynolds freelancer for the belmont citizen harold keke tributary here at belmont media and today i have the distinct privilege to bring to you miss patricia state auburn who is running for auditor here in the state of massachusetts so first thing i need to ask you is when everybody hears the auditors coming everyone runs and hides are you finding people are welcoming to the auditors well the auditors role in the state is not to go out and audit taxpayer dollars and so basically the auditor has under their purview three hundred seventy five state agencies that are funded with that taxpayers dollars three hundred seventy five agencies and how often are they audit a d c agencies well  originally when the present state auditor came into office and her name is suzanne bump the mass general law which was section eleven chapter eleven section twelve actually read that those three hundred seventy five state agencies should be audited once every two years and she found that she had an inability to do that so she actually went back to the state legislature in a short period of time and initiated discussions with the state legislature to just change law and the law was changed within the budget process of two thousand and twelve and what it then stated from that point forward that three hundred seventy five state agencies should be audited once every three years so going to the back of the line which agency went to the back of the line to be audible they all did they all did so we started a whole new q well you know what happened was originally under the prior auditor they were audit ng supposedly by law or one hundred eighty seven point five when it was once every two years right this go round now that we've dropped it down to once every three years it's one hundred twenty five audits so i have a chart that actually shows the results of what his present state auditor has done and i hope everybody at home can see that but the first year which is two thousand and eleven if the benchmark is one hundred twenty five hundred thirty three audits were done of a myriad of different agencies but actually joda ngugi who was the prior auditor gutter across the line because many of these audits were already work in process and that was stated in the cover letter right but when he actually have lost that would have been an old staff correct yes she actually implemented a new staff did actually fired some of the staff that she felt were in up to par with their education level so she actually brought up the education level with bachelor's in accounting and people at least having about this degree so that being said her second year in office she did eighty nine audits for twelve months the third year in office which was last year sixty four audits and then the fourth year which is twenty fourteen right now as we reelect her or possibly elect me for a statewide office as of september first there were thirty two audits done and that's when i put the chart together but actually for the month of september they did for more audit for the whole year so far when the benchmark is up here a hundred twenty five thirty six audits have been done as of october first so as a taxpayer you could see where my concern would be amongst these numbers who got left out was the left out who's not being looked at who's like scamming the system as we all know has been in the news you know we've seen a lot of things the five hundred managers move to the private sector there's a lot of yes and of course we should be willing in this actually was where they were removed to great because you know there's that so much distrust so it's very it's very happen to get yourself into this mess well i actually grew up done in the new bedford area where i grew up and sell dartmouth was born in new bedford i went to bishop stang high school and then i went on to providence college where i studied accounting so i actually have a science in accounting and then i came up to boston and canvass my resume and got a job with one of the major banks here in downtown boston first out of school and i audited four come bank called the shawmut bank you're probably now ha that for four years i studied accounting and for roughly four years i audited and so that's what i bring to the equation i bring thought private sector experience bring the professional background from my degree as well as the job to the auditors office and i am troubled by what i see there seems to be a lack of attention to detail going on with the auditors often the sort accountants are all about detail exactly there's no systems in place i mean you asked earlier about what seems to be giving and what's not being audited and for example right now we're only auditing about twelve housing authorities on an annual basis i think it's thirteen or fourteen it's somewhere in that state why and how many are there statewide hundreds gosh yes and denude she actually audited sixty two housing authorities in two thousand and seven and so with each of these agencies it should be audited what's under the auditors purview are some of the support information technology or i t audits the judicial law and sheriff's offices and the court systems and the court systems have just report been reported in the paper as well as lacking so my financial oversight and transportation audits which would be the mouse department of transportation right so there are many audits as i say there's three hundred seventy five state agencies that should be audited regularly and they're not being audited and this is a problem so and you think it's as we've been hearing in the news a lot it's you know the one charlie baker certainly is talking about the one team on the field and how it's just the democrats that are pulling all these things do you think that's part of it do you think these people have friends in the legislators of everyone all looking mean how often do they go up and change the law to benefit us the taxpayer in a time to i think probably off camera to come up with a good one so event that's definitely concerning but let me ask you a question you're running as a republican yes i'm more i'm talking to you the more i'm thinking this is really is the type of a job that shouldn't be either one but let's say martha coakley wins and she's the new governor and you win and you're the auditor how would you work with this legislation right now as it is right now it without any of the changes to get anything done if you feel like you're going against the this one team on the field mentality well the auditor has a lot of independence and least that's how i view it the present auditor hasn't totally you know she has used the legislature when she's wanted to but it is not a job where you vote or you legislate that's the beauty of it really it's primary goal is to be looking out for the public interest and that's the taxpayer and that is the government what governmental auditing is all about number one goal is the public interest so i do hope to take this job not so much that i have to you know rub elbows or knock anybody out of the way just put my nose to the grindstone and do what i've been trained to do which is a better job to excel at this job rather than having the chart showing the audience going precipitously down you know what's wrong with having them go up  incline so that we start accomplishing more audits each year as opposed to less audits each year so what that you do not and you come up with something very important and you need to bring it to the legislature to have it implemented are to have something change but you're battling a completely democratic party that really may not want to see these changes how would you handle something like that well i would get the republicans as many as they are on board i mean the republicans do get thrown some  items here and there that they are able to get across the finish line and i think it would be a party interest i mean even would you i guess my question is would you ever go to the press could you would you be comfortable with that would you say i found this terrible thing and we need to all do this i mean come out with some of the welfare changes and i did go to the paper as well she she does go to the papers quite a bit what i've seen her go to the papers for are things that on thorough for example she went to the papers for the department of child and family  march of this year right but that only reviewed the foster care aspect of d c s the audit did not have her under its purview the in home services of department of child and family which sadly is where all the incidences have occurred and where dust have occurred and believe me i'm not pinning a death on the auditor if i become auditor i'm not a social worker but i'm just saying professionally when you audit an agency you do it it is in its entirety you don't do half of the agency and particularly pick and choose where you're going to place your auditors you look at the whole agency and that's not what i see being done for the taxpayer if you're going to review an agency you do the whole thing well that's that's a terrific way to look at something like this you know i certainly admire the fact that you have that put yourself out there as the as you told me off camera that you know you're probably your whole life's been turned upside down as you go through this so your passion for what you believe is true is  coming through loud and clear and i think that's great why don't you if you could wrap up really quick so our viewers know why they should vote for you sure why you should vote for me is that you should look at what's going on on line with these audits and that they are  answer is to professionalize this office i have about as an accounting from providence college i've also audited professionally i can do a better job because i've done so professionally i hope to excel at this job getting a passing grade is not enough and that's what the present state auditor likes to put layer hat on is that she's got a passing grade out of the national state auditors association but all forty eight states that contract with this particular firm have gotten the passing grade i want to right i hope to have your vote thank you to reflect missing mom and i really appreciate you being here so that's the last that we're going to bring you here from the republican town committee at belmont and i can thank tommy olson for allowing me to meet these wonderful people who are trying so hard to change the lives of all of us the one thing i will say before i say goodbye is you need to get out and vote you can't sit here and complain if you don't vote regardless of how you feel about anything that we've presented or anyone has presented you need to vote voting is a privilege and a right as americans and i hope to see every one of you at the voting booth so that you again to the belmont republican town committee and we will see you all on the election night on november fourth right here thank you