The Dallas Independent School District in Dallas, Texas has fallen under scrutiny as of late. According to investigators, the biggest problem the school district had was a lack of planning and guidelines that stemmed from the abuse of credit cards by district employees, leading to an unbelievable amount of debt for the school district
This small program quickly ballooned, however, and soon over 1,400 employees were carrying around the school district’s plastic. Some employees even had five credit cards, with each coming from a different account within the district. In the end, over 3,000 credit cards were issued and, within a three year time period, the employees had racked up over $71 million in debt.
Amazingly, few rules were established with the credit card program. Administrators stopped keeping tabs on the expenditures and asked employees to monitor their own spending. In fact, employees were not even required to turn in their expense receipts. Rather, they were asked to hold on to them just in case they were asked later to show how their money was spent.
The spending within the school district grew so out of control that one school contained a storage room that staffers referred to as the Wal-Mart because it was so filled with electronics, decorations, and other items. In addition, there was over $1 million spent on gift cards that the cardholders than turned around and used to spend on personal items – all of which was paid for with state and federal grant money.
In an effort to try to get out of the debt that was created by the credit card program, the district will likely attempt to recoup any sales tax that was paid with the cards since schools are exempt from paying these taxes. They will also audit several of their programs and create clearer rules about what is and is not an acceptable school purchase.
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