Woodstock City Manager Jeff Moon said Friday that he demanded the resignation of Chief Financial Officer Henry Bucci because two outside annual audits in a row had found that the city Finance Department had kept poor records.
In one case, Moon said, the department neglected to note that it had sent a $600,000 payment on a water and sewer bond, but that was not discovered until the audit. Bucci resigned Jan. 26, three days after the mayor and City Council decided in executive session to terminate the relationship.
Bucci said he had felt he was slipping out of favor after his requests for more staff on at least two occasions in the past two years had been denied.
He said the failure to note the $600,000 payment on the water and sewer bond was an oversight by a "subordinate," but it was ultimately his responsibility.
"When they ask you to resign, what can you say?" Bucci said.
Moon said Friday that Bucci had on at least two occasions in 2009 been late on payments to employees’ voluntary contribution retirement plans. But the payments were made and the city went to an automated system after that. There were no more late payments.
He said Bucci's mistakes were not enough to call for an investigation but were significant enough that "we needed to make a change." Bucci was fired from his previous job as financial director for the city of East Point, but Woodstock officials were not aware of problems in East Point. According to his Woodstock personnel file, his immediate supervisor in East Point gave him a glowing recommendation.
One of the notes written in the margin of his Woodstock reference check form, jotted down by the person who interviewed Bucci's East Point supervisor, reads: "A valuable employee. Productivity of about 4 people." Another: "Henry understands finances. Sound financial manager. Henry did an excellent job."
About a year after Woodstock hired Bucci, the city of East Point hired an outside investigator to examine the city's contracting process. The investigator noted in his report that in June 2007 Bucci had transferred about $1.7 million from the city's capital improvement plan into the general fund to "expedite the construction process," but "the funds were never expended" for capital purposes.
East Point interim City Manager Nina Hickson said Friday that the money was not missing, that it had been used for other expenses.
Bucci said Friday that he was aware of the talk.
"It's not like I walked away with $1.7 million," he said. "If I had, I wouldn't be talking to you. I'd be in Brazil."
Bucci said he was a political victim in East Point when his direct supervisor was replaced, and he said a similar thing happened in Woodstock. He cited the denied requests for additional staff as an example.
"I never got the help, so you do the best you can," he said. "Then we brought in an auditor who was a friend of the city manager and was very critical, and he’s writing us up over everything."
Moon said he had worked with the auditor when he was city manager in Riverdale and knew he was thorough. Moon also said the Finance Department added three people in the four years Bucci ran it, but the city turned down his requests for more help "due to the economy and budgetary constraints."
About the Author
