By A Systemwide Risk Management employee for the Cal State University has incurred nearly $159,000 in travel costs over two years, generating questionable expenses on trips to San Francisco, London, Kenya, Ghana and more, according to a CSU audit report released last week.
Within a week of the report’s release, CSU Executive Vice Chancellor and Chief Financial Officer Benjamin Quillian — who requested the audit — revealed that he will retire from his position later this year, according to CSU Spokesman Mike Uhlenkamp. He also said that Quillian’s department supervises SRM.
The internal audit reviewed 146 travel expense claims and found that the SRM employee, who remains anonymous throughout the report, racked up approximately $158,994 in travel costs from July 2010 through September 2012.
According to its website, SRM protects the CSU “from catastrophic liability and other financial losses” by providing risk management services.
The audit report asserted that the employee’s expenses were “often questionable in terms of their appropriateness and business necessity and did not always have a clear or demonstrable benefit to … the CSU.”
According to Uhlenkamp, Quillian has decided to retire for his own reasons; however, President of the Statewide University Police Association Jeff Solomon alleged Wednesday that Quillian’s retirement is connected to the audit’s findings.
“The timing of his retirement is suspicious,” Solomon said. “It seems to me that if you discover something like this, that you follow it through to its end.”
Solomon said he also found it suspicious that SUPA has not been asked to conduct an investigation into the audit’s findings.
Uhlenkamp, though, said Quillian’s retirement and the audit report are unrelated and that SUPA is linking the two as a bargaining tactic for contract negotiations between the CSU and police union.
“There is absolutely no connection between the two,” Uhlenkamp said. “These items are only linked in the eyes of an organization that is trying to get raises from the CSU.”
In listing the “questionable” travel expenses, the report said the SRM employee traveled to San Francisco 82 times, was reimbursed for a car wash at LAX parking garage and used limo services to travel to and from airports in a least eight instances during the two-year period reviewed.
The CSU’s travel policy states that the system will pay for or reimburse “ordinary, reasonable, not extravagant, and necessary” travel-related expenses for conducting official business, according to the report.
However, the audit found that the CSU sometimes reimbursed the employee for questionable, illogical and inefficient costs, some of which the employee may not have been entitled to claim.
It also found that the employee sometimes failed to provide adequate documentation for reimbursement.
Uhlenkamp said that of the $158,994 in expenditures, the CSU could not determine exactly how much was used inappropriately.
“Some of the travel is on legitimate CSU business … There’s a little bit of deviation,” he said. “A portion of [the expenditures] was inappropriate, but unfortunately we don’t have an exact number.”
He also said that the expenditures were not the audit’s primary focus, as Quillian had originally requested an audit of the department’s practices and policies.
Solomon said he was appalled by the extra findings of the audit.
“What I’m more appalled about is how [the CSU] handled the situation and not being more forthcoming with the information,” he said, “[and that there were] no stopgaps in place to stop this before this audit was done.”
According to a CSU statement, the employee has reimbursed many of the questionable expenses and the system is determining further appropriate action.
“The CSU places great importance on funding provided by the state and our students and it is critical that we use each and every dollar in the most appropriate way to serve students and fulfill our mission,” CSU Chancellor Timothy P. White said in the statement. “We will review our travel policies and practices to minimize any possibility of recurrence.”
The statement also said that the CSU will continue to implement the report’s recommendations, which include determining the business necessity for frequent travel and improving post-review of travel-related expenditures.
