STATE OF FLORIDA

DIVISION OF ADMINISTRATIVE HEARINGS

STATE OF FLORIDA, DEPARTMENT OF ) LABOR AND EMPLOYMENT SECURITY, ) DIVISION OF EMPLOYMENT AND )

TRAINING, )

)

Petitioner, )

)

vs. ) CASE NO. 81-2755

) LEVY COUNTY BOARD OF COUNTY ) COMMISSIONERS, )

)

Respondent. )

)

RECOMMENDED ORDER

Pursuant to notice a formal hearing was held in the above-styled case on 23 February 1982 at Tallahassee, Florida.

APPEARANCES

For Petitioner: Sonja P. Mathews, Esquire

Suite 131, Montgomery Building 2562 Executive Center Circle, East Tallahassee, Florida 32301

For Respondent: Gregory Beauchamp, Esquire

County Attorney

Post Office Drawer A Chiefland, Florida 32626

By Request for Hearing received in the Division of Administrative Hearings November 4, 1981, Levy County, Respondent, requests a hearing to contest Florida Department of Labor and Employment Security, Division of Employment and Training's, Petitioner's, allegation that Respondent had spent grant funds in violation of the Comprehensive Employment and Training Act, and should remit the overpayment to Petitioner.

At the hearing each party called one witness and one exhibit was admitted into evidence. The facts are undisputed. Respondent stipulated that the two questioned payments were made to ineligible participants.

FINDINGS OF FACT

1. Participant Carmel Rachells, Contract No. 80-ET87054801010, was ineligible for employment by reason of having two part-time jobs and wrongfully received the sum of $3,279.

2. Participant Jerry B. Geiger, Contract No. 80-ET87054801011, was ineligible for employment by reason of having worked at another job within ten weeks of his Comprehensive Employment and Training Act (CETA) employment and wrongfully received the sum of $2,070.

   
   

3. When Rachells' application was taken by the intake clerk, she told of her last two full-time jobs but did not disclose to the intake clerk that she had part-time jobs. When a thirty-day review of the application was done on this participant, the application and determination of eligibility was deemed correct and the appointment reasonable and internally consistent.

   
   

4. A quarterly random verification of the participants in this contract was done, but Rachells was not one of those randomly selected for verification. Rachells was discharged before her ineligibility was discovered.

   
   

5. Jerry Geiger advised the intake clerk that he had been unemployed for ten weeks prior to his application when, in fact, he had been unemployed only four weeks. He advised the name of his last employer was his supervisor at Thriftway, one Johnson, and not Thriftway. Geiger was one of those selected for random sampling, but the inquiry addressed to Johnson was not answered. Geiger was discharged before the true facts of his prior employment were learned.

   
   

6. At the time these two unauthorized participants were employed Respondent was following the regulations establishing eligibility requirements for participants. There was some misunderstanding on the part of the intake clerk and applicants were not fully questioned about part-time jobs. No fraudulent act on the part of Respondent contributed to the unauthorized employment.

   
   

7. Following the audit which disclosed these unauthorized participants, Respondent has adopted a procedure whereby all participants are verified before being placed in the program.

   
   

8. Both of these contracts were Title 6 projects and these two participants were the only ones to whom wrongful payments were made. The total sum involved in Contract No. 80-ET87054801010 was $33,615, and the sum involved in Contract No. 80-ET87054801011 was $89,280.

   
   

   CONCLUSIONS OF LAW

   
   

9. The Division of Administrative Hearings has jurisdiction over the parties to, and the subject matter of, these proceedings.

   
   

10. Both of the questioned participants were wrongfully employed by Respondent despite an effort to fully comply with the regulations establishing eligibility for participants.

    
    

11. 20 CFR 676.88 provides costs involving misspent funds associated with ineligible participants and public service employment programs may be allowed when the Grant Officer finds:

    
    

    1. The activity was not fraudulent and the violation did not take place with the knowledge of the recipient or subrecipient; and

    2. Immediate action was taken to remove the ineligible participant; and

    3. Eligibility determination procedures, or other such management systems and mechanisms required in these regulations, were properly followed and monitored; and

    4. Immediate action was taken to remedy the problem causing the questioned activity or ineligibility; and

    5. The magnitude of the questioned costs or activities is not substantial.

From the foregoing it is concluded that these unlawful payments were not fraudulent, that both ineligible participants were terminated before their ineligibility was discovered, that Levy County followed proper procedures in processing these applications, that Levy County has taken appropriate action to preclude a recurrence of a similar situation and the sums involved are not substantial. It is, therefore,

RECOMMENDED that the Grant Officer allow Levy County the costs involving the unlawful payments made to Rachells and Geiger as above noted in the total amount of $5,349.

ENTERED this 4th day of March, 1982, at Tallahassee, Florida.

K. N. AYERS, Hearing Officer Division of Administrative Hearings The Oakland Building

2009 Apalachee Parkway

Tallahassee, Florida 32301

(904) 488-9675

Filed with the Clerk of the Division of Administrative Hearings this 4th day of March, 1982.

COPIES FURNISHED:

Sonja Mathews, Esquire Department of Labor and

Employment Security

Suite 131, Montgomery Building 2562 Executive Center Circle, East Tallahassee, Florida 32301

Gregory Beauchamp, Esquire County Attorney, Levy County Post Office Drawer A Chiefland, Florida 32626

Wallace E. Orr, Secretary Department of Labor and

Employment Security

206 Berklay Building Tallahassee, Florida 32301

Docket for Case No: 81-002755

Orders for Case No: 81-002755