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Today’s Popcorn Moment: City-County Councilor Michael-Paul Hart joins to talk about unaccounted for OPHS money · Tony Katz | Popcorn Moment

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  Speaker 1: Let's go, Let's go, let's go, let's go. It's a
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  Speaker 1: story you need to hear to believe. Then grab your
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  Speaker 1: popcorn because there is more. We spoke yesterday about City
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  Speaker 1: County Councilor Michael Paul Hart and changes to the Office
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  Speaker 1: of Public Health and Safety o PHS. The story there
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  Speaker 1: at WIBC dot com, Jarrett lewis reporting that federal funds
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  Speaker 1: came in to help this program, which Mayor Hawks that created,
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  Speaker 1: I believe was in twenty nineteen. They have gone from
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  Speaker 1: a nineteen million dollar budget to at thirty five million
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  Speaker 1: dollar budget.
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  Speaker 2: It's a seventy five percent.
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  Speaker 1: Increase, and there's money missing, and there's money not accounted for,
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  Speaker 1: and the audits that have been done.
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  Speaker 2: Show the story.
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  Speaker 1: So what is counselor Heart saying no more money until
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  Speaker 1: you can explain where the money is. The counselor joins us, right,
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  Speaker 1: and now Counselor Heart. You can follow him on the
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  Speaker 1: Twitter x Counselor Heart ha RT There, Michael Paul Hart,
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  Speaker 1: I appreciate you taking the time. Let's start with the audit.
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  Speaker 1: Is this a standard practice? Is this something that was
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  Speaker 1: asked for? How did the audit of OPHS the Office
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  Speaker 1: of Public Health and Safety come to be?
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  Speaker 3: Certainly so, the audit they're new and they're old, right.
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  Speaker 3: So we have an Office of Audit and Performance and
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  Speaker 3: they're really selective on what they can audit. And there's
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  Speaker 3: two counselors who sit on the committee for this that
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  Speaker 3: meets quarterly. It's myself and another counselor, Counselor Boots.
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  Speaker 4: And over the years we've.
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  Speaker 3: Seen some agencies have issues like this, another one being
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  Speaker 3: the Indiana Housing Agency or Indianapolis Housing Agency, very similar issues.
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  Speaker 3: And then as the years ago went on, from twenty nineteen,
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  Speaker 3: I started seeing some of these troubling issues and started
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  Speaker 3: bringing that up in the Audit committee, and between my
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  Speaker 3: pressure on them some of the other members of that committee,
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  Speaker 3: even the Mayor's office himself, they urged that internal Office of.
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  Speaker 4: Audit and Performance to start.
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  Speaker 3: Looking into the Office of public health and safety, and
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  Speaker 3: that's where it actually began from.
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  Speaker 1: So you start seeing these issues, you start actually getting
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  Speaker 1: even conversations from the mayor's office of hey, what's happening here?
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  Speaker 1: What is happening here? If you've gone from nineteen million
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  Speaker 1: to thirty five million, and we can argue that's way
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  Speaker 1: too much, not enough. People can have all sorts of
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  Speaker 1: arguments how much is actually missing?
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  Speaker 4: Yeah, and that's the.
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  Speaker 3: Part I'm trying to figure out too, because this goes
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  Speaker 3: back a long time. You mentioned twenty nineteen and that
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  Speaker 3: I'll started with ARPA, right, So we received as a
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  Speaker 3: city four hundred and twenty million dollars at that point
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  Speaker 3: in time, and what I was adamantly opposed to was
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  Speaker 3: giving all that money over to the mayor's office. Well,
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  Speaker 3: our majority Democrat council provided all that money over there,
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  Speaker 3: and even as far back as twenty twenty two, I
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  Speaker 3: created an ordinance that required them to come back and
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  Speaker 3: show us where all that money was going.
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  Speaker 4: They never did that, and.
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  Speaker 3: Then years continued to go forward, and we ended up
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  Speaker 3: in twenty twenty three, after you know, there was tens
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  Speaker 3: of million dollars.
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  Speaker 4: For you know, ARPA.
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  Speaker 3: Spend on homelessness, A fifty million dollars spent on what
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  Speaker 3: was called the Elevation Grant program. And after they came
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  Speaker 3: back for another appropriation on this elevation grant, which is
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  Speaker 3: what the mayor calls crime reduction, which you know so
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  Speaker 3: much to call a flush fund. He comes in and
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  Speaker 3: he said, we need another you know, contribution for this
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  Speaker 3: and we said I looked at I said, no way,
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  Speaker 3: because you're not showing me what you're doing. So last
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  Speaker 3: year was the first example of me sending in another
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  Speaker 3: resolution that said, look, if you watch your money, show
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  Speaker 3: us how you spent it up to the point. And
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  Speaker 3: they partnered with IU and they came up with a
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  Speaker 3: feel good report, but it still never showed exactly what
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  Speaker 3: their dollars were actually go in courts or what they were.
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  Speaker 2: To take a moment, let me take a moment.
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  Speaker 1: Start talking to Counselor Michael Paul Hart of the Indianapolis
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  Speaker 1: City County Council. I want to go back a little
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  Speaker 1: more detail on the numbers. This starts in twenty nineteen.
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  Speaker 1: First of all, you mentioned ARPA. Just a quick description of.
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  Speaker 2: What ARPA is.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, the ARPA is an American Rescue Plan Act. So
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  Speaker 3: there was you know, two sets of funds that came
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  Speaker 3: under two presidents during COVID. One was the American Rescue
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  Speaker 3: Plan and the other one was the Cares Act. Those
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  Speaker 3: in total combined to four hundred and twenty million dollars
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  Speaker 3: from the federal government, and that's.
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  Speaker 1: Four hundred and twenty million went to the mayor's office
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  Speaker 1: at the behest of Democrats on the city County Council
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  Speaker 1: for the mayor to do with as the mayor chose.
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  Speaker 3: There were some federal requirements on how are they spent,
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  Speaker 3: but by and large, yes, it was you know, passed
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  Speaker 3: over from the council to the mayor's office.
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  Speaker 1: Now, of that four hundred and twenty million, this project,
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  Speaker 1: this public safety project received how much money over those
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  Speaker 1: couple of years.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, there's a definitive forty million that went towards housing
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  Speaker 3: during the COVID time.
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  Speaker 4: So that would be for folks who were.
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  Speaker 3: Essentially homeless that they would put them in a hotel
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  Speaker 3: for however long COVID was going on for. And then
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  Speaker 3: there was rental Assistance Fund, so if you remember, there
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  Speaker 3: was moratoriums on evictions and so they were you know,
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  Speaker 3: handing out money to pay rents, and then there was
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  Speaker 3: the beginning of what was called the Elevation grants, which
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  Speaker 3: was the crime Intervention program where the mayor went out
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  Speaker 3: and that was another forty million dollars, and so that
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  Speaker 3: was in the vein of the work that the Office
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  Speaker 3: of Public Health and Safety does.
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  Speaker 1: So again I asked the question, this is not putting
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  Speaker 1: you on the spot. I want to make sure we
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  Speaker 1: all understand the numbers. The money that they get year
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  Speaker 1: after year. Is finding that forty five million dollars from
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  Speaker 1: the moment this started happening in twenty twenty to now
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  Speaker 1: forty five million dollars in total cannot be accounted for.
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  Speaker 3: So what's what's the audit is showing us is that
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  Speaker 3: you know, those were special appropriations from the audit and
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  Speaker 3: there's a potential some of those cannot be accounted for.
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  Speaker 4: Right now.
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  Speaker 3: The State Board of Accounts is actually also doing an
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  Speaker 3: investigation after this internal audit came out, and they're looking
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  Speaker 3: into some of those federal spendings. So that part is
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  Speaker 3: still to be determined. And then there's the annual appropriations
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  Speaker 3: that that office gets, and that's a lot of what
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  Speaker 3: the current audit was looking at. So when we talk
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  Speaker 3: about that seventeen to thirty four that's the money they
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  Speaker 3: get every single year.
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  Speaker 4: To do their annual programmatic activities.
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  Speaker 1: That's seventeen to thirty four million comes from who's your
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  Speaker 1: taxpayers or does it come from the federal government?
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  Speaker 3: That comes from city taxpayers.
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  Speaker 2: City taxpayers.
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  Speaker 1: So they're paying seventeen to thirty four million into this program,
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  Speaker 1: this Office of Public Health and Safety. In your view,
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  Speaker 1: counselor talking to counselor city county counselor, Michael Paul Hart,
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  Speaker 1: Does this office do anything?
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  Speaker 2: Is there any value that gets created out of this office?
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  Speaker 4: Yes?
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  Speaker 2: And no.
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  Speaker 3: Right, So, there are some good things that they do,
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  Speaker 3: but there's also some things that I have a whole
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  Speaker 3: lot of questions about. Right when we look at our
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  Speaker 3: winter contingency program on homelessness, I think they do a
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  Speaker 3: good job of making sure that when it's below freezing
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  Speaker 3: and it's terribly dangerous outside for people, they are the
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  Speaker 3: office that make sure that we do have places for
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  Speaker 3: those people to go, and I'll say.
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  Speaker 4: They do a good job there.
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  Speaker 3: On the other side of the coin, right, they are
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  Speaker 3: also in charge of what's called the violence Reduction program,
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  Speaker 3: in which I have been very skeptical about for years
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  Speaker 3: and is one of their largest expenditure in which I
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  Speaker 3: don't think it's doing anything good for the city of Indianapolis,
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  Speaker 3: and I think it's taking money away from other parts
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  Speaker 3: of the city. And that's where a lot of my
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  Speaker 3: issues come in, especially with this audit, because essentially what
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  Speaker 3: the audit is saying is if they go pick a
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  Speaker 3: program in an organization to do crime reduction activity, there
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  Speaker 3: was no validation that that organization did what they said
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  Speaker 3: they were going to do, and there was no validation
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  Speaker 3: that what they did actually helped reduce crime at all.
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  Speaker 1: Well, I can appreciate that we have a government program
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  Speaker 1: that doesn't actually do anything, and that we sadly allow
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  Speaker 1: ourselves to pay into programs for the idea of paying
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  Speaker 1: into a program so we can claim that we're doing
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  Speaker 1: a good So there's seventeen to thirty four million from
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  Speaker 1: the city taxpayers, there's forty five million from the federal
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  Speaker 1: government that is simply unaccountant for. We're trying to figure
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  Speaker 1: out from this audit where this forty five million might be.
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  Speaker 1: And this has all led you, counselor to say, no
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  Speaker 1: more money. We're not giving you any more money. We're
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  Speaker 1: not doing this anymore. How has that been received by
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  Speaker 1: fellow counselors and the mayor's office.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, they quickly took to know the sympathy they are
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  Speaker 3: looking for, you know, the sympathy vote on this last night.
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  Speaker 3: We actually had a committee hearing last night on this.
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  Speaker 3: And you know, the concerns from the Democrats is that, oh,
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  Speaker 3: we're going to lose this money and it's going to
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  Speaker 3: hurt these people. And what I try to reiterate to
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  Speaker 3: them over and over again is, look, if they're showing
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  Speaker 3: us that they're doing good work, they can keep the money.
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  Speaker 4: But show us that you're doing it.
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  Speaker 3: And my proposal was stating is you need to create
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  Speaker 3: standard operating procedures. You need to make sure you have
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  Speaker 3: oversight by the counsel and by other agencies that are
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  Speaker 3: the Office of Finance and Management, and have ethics trainings.
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  Speaker 3: Do all these things by the end of the year,
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  Speaker 3: and you keep your money. But if you don't, then
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  Speaker 3: you shouldn't have any money because you can't spend the
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  Speaker 3: taxpayers money appropriately. So what the Democrats said is, we
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  Speaker 3: can't take this money away because we're going to hurt
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  Speaker 3: all these people and effectively just made that argument all
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  Speaker 3: night last night.
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  Speaker 2: But does that all argument fall on deef ears?
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  Speaker 1: And as a follow up would be, if the mayor's
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  Speaker 1: office wanted the audit done, how can democrats on the
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  Speaker 1: council be opposed to the idea of not funding a
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  Speaker 1: program that might be having its money utilize them properly
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  Speaker 1: or not properly its tract.
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  Speaker 4: And there's a lot of conversation to have there.
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  Speaker 3: And that's why I keep trying to tell my colleagues
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  Speaker 3: is that you know this is it started.
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  Speaker 4: From the Mayor's office.
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  Speaker 3: The mayor's office put out a statement that he wanted
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  Speaker 3: to see the audit, and you know that's what is
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  Speaker 3: you know, perplexing to me is if he knew there
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  Speaker 3: was issues, why would he put the pressure on himself?
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  Speaker 4: But is he also putting the pressure back on the.
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  Speaker 3: Council democrats because you know, there's nineteen of them on
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  Speaker 3: the city Council and it's their responsibility to be the
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  Speaker 3: fiduciary agents of the city.
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  Speaker 4: And it is mine as well. And that's where I
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  Speaker 4: think we have.
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  Speaker 3: To have the responsibility, especially under right now they're also
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  Speaker 3: talking thinking about doing a wheel tax increase, and so
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  Speaker 3: they've done nothing to look at cost reduction in spending.
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  Speaker 4: There's a big glaring black eye from this audit report
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  Speaker 4: that says we have.
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  Speaker 3: Unaccounted money or money spent without any proof of that
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  Speaker 3: it was going to the right people. And they're actually
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  Speaker 3: trying to raise taxes at the same time, and so
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  Speaker 3: it's a very interesting position to be in. And I
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  Speaker 3: don't know where they can defend their position, but they're
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  Speaker 3: trying to in the name of the goodwill of what
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  Speaker 3: they think the office is doing.
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  Speaker 1: Counselor Michael Paul Hart, I appreciate you taking the time
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  Speaker 1: to be with us Indianapolis City a County Council.
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  Speaker 2: We will discuss more of this.
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  Speaker 1: You can find more about the counselor at Michael Paul
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: Hart's h Art Michael Paulheart dot com.
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  Speaker 2: Thank you a quick check of traffic with the