Report: TBI overspent for 4 years
Facing budget shortfalls, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation dipped into its cash reserves to make ends meet for four years, leaving those reserves “greatly diminished,” according to a state review released Tuesday.
The agency’s reliance on savings coincided with several years when Gov. Bill Haslam required wide-ranging budget cuts. The TBI intentionally used its reserves to avoid layoffs and meet the required cuts without losing services.
During a meeting of the Senate Finance, Ways and Means Committee on Tuesday, state Comptroller Justin Wilson told lawmakers the makeshift system was “a real problem.” The comptroller’s report pointed out that two of TBI’s reserve funds had been overdrawn in recent years.
TBI has underestimated operating costs and overestimated revenue since 2014, according to the report. Both errors should have been “detected and corrected” during the budgeting process, the report said.
TBI leaders cited in the report said they didn’t ask for extra funding in budget requests because they “did not expect such requests would be approved through the Governor’s budget process.”
Lawmakers were critical of that strategy during a hearing Tuesday, although they were careful to couch negative comments with praise for TBI’s law enforcement work.
“That is about as poor a financial management process as you can do,” said state Sen. Bo Watson, R-Hixson, who called for the examination of TBI’s budget and accounting in 2017, after the agency made a special request for $8 million to buy a plane.
“It’s clandestine at the minimum, and I think we can do a whole lot more for TBI if we know exactly what we need to be doing for TBI.”
Wilson said better communication between TBI and the state would be necessary for things to improve.
“TBI needs to say what they need and what happens if they don’t get the money,” Wilson said.
While speaking to lawmakers Tuesday, TBI Director Mark Gwyn said he would use the report to “make a stronger TBI.”
“I’m going to take every recommendation that the comptroller made to heart,” Gwyn said. “I feel I have an obligation not only to you but to the citizens of the state to say what the needs are.”
The review found a series of other issues at TBI. The report recommended TBI consider adding full-time staff to accommodate a fast-growing workload and found that the purchase of the airplane could have been more cost effective even though it followed state rules.
An audit released along with the report found failures to collect all sex offender registration fees and problems that made the drug offender registry inaccurate or out of date.
But multiple speakers at Tuesday’s meeting made a point to reiterate their confidence in the agency.
“To be clear there was never any concern about any wrongdoing,” said Sen. John Stevens, R-Huntingdon. “We asked the comptroller’s office to help us with a better understanding of how we got here.”
The committee did not take any action Tuesday, but Watson said the report would be taken into consideration during the budget approval process this spring.
Reach Adam Tamburin at atamburin@tennessean.com or 615-726-5986 and on Twitter @tamburintweets.