Observations all along the line - Kimball & the Southern Panhandle First

County rescinds payment pending further information

Following the financial and general report given by Kimball County Ambulance Director Carla Goranson the Kimball County Board of Commissioners amended their agenda and further considered a policy regarding extraordinary circumstances concerning salaries and expenses.

Matt Turman, the attorney for the commissioners, stated that additional information needs reviewed to determine whether payment for parts of the claims are authorized under law.

“We need to make a motion to amend the agenda to add, as an emergency item, the review of the expenditures from the three ambulance volunteers that got stranded in Scottsbluff,” Turman said. “We need to state, for the record, the reason for amending it, which is, some additional information came to light that we need to take some time to look at, as to whether or not the county can make that payment to those employees.”

Sibal clarified that the ‘amended actions’ would cover the board rescinding previous action taken on the matter.

Goranson questioned the policy in place for processing and making changes to claims received for commissioner’s review at the most recent Kimball County Commissioner’s meeting.

The question stems from amendment made to a claim prior to presentation for payment to the board, which included hourly wages for volunteer EMTs while stranded in Scottsbluff on Christmas day.

County Clerk Cathy Sibal followed a directive from Kimball County Commissioner Tim Nolting to remove hourly pay from the claim prior to presenting it to the board.

The altered claim was then approved for reimbursement of lodging and meals but without hourly wages for the three volunteers.

Goranson stated that in the medical field there are specific ways billing must be done. She then questioned if payroll was considered a legal document and if so, who has the authority to alter it?

“The only question we had was, when we present a claim, who can alter it?” Goranson asked.

“We can’t alter it, we can deny or approve it,” Commissioner Larry Engstrom answered.

“We had conversation with Carla and conversation with Tim (Nolting) and knew there were some iffy things whether that would be paid or not. So based on instructions from Tim, we removed that from the claim so it wasn’t processed,” Sibal said. “There has been the history in claims. If there is something questionable and we are not sure if they are going to pay it or not pay it, Carla was aware of it, Tim was aware of it, we are aware of it, that we remove that until there could be a resolution.”

Goranson said that she was previously unaware of the practice.

“When we talked you said ‘Let’s take it to the board,’” Goranson said. “So we would take the whole claim as is. I don’t want my documents changed until the board sees them in full.”

The board rescinded an earlier motion to pay the claim pending further review and will deny that portion of the claim pending further information from Turman.

 
 
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