VOORHEESVILLE — Tuesday, Sarita Winchell returned to work.

State auditors completed their field work within Voorheesville’s school buildings, and cleared all current employees of any wrongdoing, school board President Joseph Pofit announced at Monday night’s meeting. The school board unanimously reinstated Assistant Superintendent for Business Sarita Winchell into active status.

She had been on administrative leave since the end of January which the board said it supported so that there could be no opportunity for allegations of the business manager impeding the investigations.

Those in the audience at Monday’s meeting clapped when they heard Winchell was returning.
"I’m very much looking forward to coming back," Winchell said enthusiastically from her home later that evening. She didn’t want to comment on her opinion about being placed on leave in the first place. She also offered no comment on her thoughts about the allegations against previous Superintendent Alan McCartney and former Assistant Superintendent for Business Anthony Marturano, two men whom Winchell had worked beside for many years. (See related story.)

Many things in Voorheesville’s business office has been reorganized since when Winchell was placed on paid leave, Pofit said. The district has been implementing recommendations given to it by the state and also outside consultants. Betty Curie of Advisory Solutions with the New York State School Boards Association submitted 50 recommendations in her report, most of which have already been implemented. And Henry Binzer, an accountant who used to be the head auditor for the State Education Department, helped implement Curies’s suggestions.

Pofit said that Gordon Durnford, who was privately contracted to fill Winchell’s post while she was on leave, will have a few sessions with Winchell to orient her, so she can pick up where he left off.

When The Enterprise asked Winchell if she was concerned about adjusting to the changes, she responded, "I don’t think it will be hard at all; business is business and I’m very positive about it." She concluded, "I’m just happy."

Clarity

Chris Allard, a bus driver for the district, said at Monday’s meeting that the last few months have been very difficult at Voorheesville, and that employee morale is low. Every day, employees come into work not knowing what to expect, she said, with her boss, Transportation director, Michael Goyer, being questioned and files being pulled.
"It’s been terrible," Allard said.

Pofit said the school board had no control over who the Albany County District Attorney’s investigator or what the state auditors wanted to look at.

The district attorney’s office subpoenaed not only McCartney’s and Marturano’s contracts but Winchell’s and Goyer’s as well — all the top administrators.

Pofit said that the school board and state auditors met together the comptroller’s investigators prepared to leave the building after eight months. They will spend the next several months writing the report, Pofit said he was told. And then the district will have a chance to respond in writing to the findings before the final document is released to the public.

The final report is expected to be released this summer. But, the auditors have completed their review and data collection within the school board and told the school board they did not find any wrongdoing by any other administrator, Pofit said.

Allard said she wanted to make sure that got recorded in the minutes, that all others have been cleared by the comptroller, because a lot of good people were targeted in the auditing process, she said.

Jennifer Freeman, spokesperson for the comptroller’s office, told The Enterprise on Tuesday that her office does not comment on the audit’s status until it is completely finished. While Pofit may have said that state auditors are out of the building, they are still completing the final report, and, until the final report is released, which is anticipated to take another couple of months, she said, she can not confirm one way or another if all others, or any other employees have been cleared.

Similarly, Rachel McEneny of the district attorney’s office, said she could not answer any of the Enterprise’s questions since the criminal investigation is ongoing.
"This is my first involvement with the DA," Pofit said, and while the investigators are very thorough, they are also very quiet.School board member James Coffin told a frustrated public on Monday night the way he looks at it is, in the absence of the comptroller coming to Voorheesville, "There’s a very good chance that nothing would ever have been found — nothing." he said.
As a member of the community, as a member on the board, as a taxpayer "as difficult as it is, I want that kind of stuff happening," Coffin said of intense investigation. "Any organization worth its salt wants this stuff pulled out," and fixed, he said
And now, Coffin said, the school board is doing its darndest to fix the situation. What he asked of the public now is for residents to do their job. When looking at the budget this year, vote on the program for the children of the community, Coffin said. Come to the budget sessions, look at the budget, ask questions, he said. "That’s your check, that’s your responsibility."

Public comment

During the public-comment segment of the board meeting, residents expressed their continued frustration to the board, feeling less informed than they would like to be.

At times, discussion became intense as people from the group asked questions about how mistakes happened in the past, who the school's attorney is, how checks were signed and approved, why it has been so hard for the newspaper to get a copy of the contracts, and why the contracts weren’t reviewed by an attorney.
"You’re missing the point," Pofit said, as people asked more questions about the contracts. What McCartney’s contract said is not what he ended up doing, Pofit said. "It’s not the contract"He did transactions that didn’t abide by his contract," Pofit said.

Coffin said one of the major changes which he thinks will make a world of difference is the two new positions of internal auditor and internal claims auditor, both who will report directly to the board.
"That was one of the weak links," Coffin said; things happened that didn’t come back to the board.
The internal auditor will be a direct employee of the board; the board can have the internal auditor look into anything — review employee records to make sure they are up to date, look at a particular employee’s travel receipts. "This is a new process and a very important process," Coffin said.

The school board has also now designated the board president to act as a chief financial officer (CFO) a new role that the board members have never taken on before, Pofit said. The superintendent is still considered the chief executive officer (CEO).

Pofit said the district has spent about $30,000 so far on litigation against McCartney and Marturano.