Perth Amboy evening news., 1922-05-23
AUDIT SHOWS BIG ERROR
IN ACCOUNTS OF CITY

Continued from page one)
ing made up. The comptroller said
the law might only require the
school estimate boards clerk to file
the certificate with the city clerk
but he should follow up the matter
and see to IL that it was brought be-
fore the council.
As the matter stands at present
the $50, 900 was not placed in the
budget due to some one forgetting
this item when the 1922 budget was
being made up. Just who was re-
sponsible is a question with the clerk
of the Board of School Estimate
claiming it was up to the comptrol-
Ter to handle and the comptroller
in turn maintaining that the school
estimate clerk should have looked
after it.
Mr.. Crowell has been asked by the
! aldermen to explain his side of the
case and when the aldermen have
this report before them they will
likely hear Mr.. Morgenson's version
of the matter. In order to care for
this phase of the financial situation
Alderman Waters introduced a reso-
luton authorizing the issuance of
$4,000 emergency bonds to pay the
teachers bonus for the year ending
June 80, 1922, which was passed.
COmpITOlieT MOfSeHSOu tniS lOII-
ing explained how the $4,000 teach
ers' bonus appropriation, although
requested last year, was allowed to
go until this years budget. In the
1921 budget, he said, there was an
item for a similar bonus for the pc
riod ending July /, 1921. To bur-
den the taxpayers with the addition
al $4,000 last year was thought
unnecessary and as a result it
was decided to put the $780,
900 in the 1922 budget. Prac-
tically a year passed before the work
of making up the new budget was
taken up and then this item slipped
the minds of those compiling it. The
comptroller declared the school
board should have showed it in ad-
dition to their regular budget when
their figures were presented to h
aldermen.
The S15,525.11 second class rail-
road tax which is worthless was ex-
planned by Alderman John c. Clark
last night by reading a series of let
tiers between Comptroller Morgenson,
City Treasurer +. William Hilker
and State Comptroller Newton A.
X. Bugbee. According to the figures
given the city. s~71,019.10 was due
the city in 1920 from second class
idiilOdo ldA' LiAobtoo Cht
was received. the city placing the
remaining s15,525.11 On i.s books as
an asset. it being expected that this
remainder would be forthcoming
shortly. Comptroller B1gbee's let
ter, however, informs the city that
IT, received all that was allotted l., the
original estimate of S~71,019.1O for
which the city took credit, having
beer made by the state using the tax
rate of the previous year which was
later corrected. AS a result of this.
which was no fault of the city, Al
derman Clark said, he moved that
the letters in the case be spread on
the minutes.
With regards the deficit shown On
the auditors balance sheet by the
difference in accounts available in
the tr~easurer's and comptroller's
Office, Comptroller Morgenson Thu
morning said such errors can no
longer exist as the result of a new
form, devised by himself, which Is
now being used in making monthly
reports from the collectors to the
comptroller's Office. The audit shows
that the three years in which the
biggest discrepancies occurred be-
tween, the city collectors and city
comptroller's Office were 1914, 1915
and 1916, a total of more than
$50, 900 not having been reported
abated during these three years. In
the five years since then only about
S1,700 is not accounted for and this,
according to the comptroller, IS
largely due to the county failing to
report certain Attachments, this TAX
ing in the period of the war.