Gibbons disregards controller's authority

Robin Reedy, chief of staff to Gov. Jim Gibbons, confirmed Wednesday that Gibbons has directed agency heads not to report to the controller's office on their handling of stimulus grants.

Controller Kim Wallin raised the issue after none of Gibbons' agency heads attended a meeting Tuesday on handling of reports to the so-called Stimulus Czar.

The legislative Interim Finance Committee approved creation of two positions, a director and an aide, to oversee reporting required by the federal government to receive $2.2 billion in American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funding.

The governor had wanted the director to be a cabinet-level position in his office, but the IFC voted to put the position at a lower-paying level under Wallin.

The jobs have not been filled yet.

Gibbons was admittedly upset after IFC voted to put oversight of stimulus funding under the controller instead of his office or the state budget office.

"We advised department heads working under the governor not to duplicate reports," Reedy said. "They were told not to attend and to report their information to budget."

Reedy said that since the governor signed documents making his administration responsible for handling ARRA money and requiring that he certify the reporting by state agencies is accurate, his office must handle the review of what agencies are doing.

"The agencies will report their numbers, then budget will send them off to the controller's office and (Wallin) can lick the stamp," Reedy said.

Wallin said representatives from Health and Human Services, Transportation, Public Safety and other agencies have shown up for past meetings on the ARRA reporting, but none of them turned out Tuesday for the training session. She said she was told they had been instructed not to.

She said not helping her office with the process could cause delays that make the state miss rapidly approaching deadlines. The first reports on how the ARRA money is being spent and what it is accomplishing are due to the federal government by Oct. 10. Failure to report, federal officials have warned, could jeopardize receipt of additional ARRA money.

"His actions could jeopardize the state," Wallin said. "It's irresponsible to be acting this way."

In the end, the dispute over management of the reporting may not make much difference since it is the agencies that report directly to the federal government on their handling of ARRA funding. The state then downloads that data from the federal government to check and verify it.

Reedy admitted, however, that overseeing the stimulus czar will be an issue since lawmakers put the funding for two positions and other costs in the controller's office instead of the governor's office.

"We will use the assets we have at our disposal to make it happen," she said.