Tuesday, May 10, 2011
By Jaclyn Shambaugh
Staff writer
The Lumbee Tribal Council is not in compliance with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, according to a report presented Monday night to the to the council.
The report stated that in a review of complaints conducted March 29 and 30, HUD found issues with the tribe’s employee and consultant contracts, excessive and inappropriate spending, and travel expenses.
As a result of the violations, the tribe will be required to repay upwards of $115,000 of its grant money.
The report said reimbursement of the funds must be made within 30 days of May 6, the date of the report sent to the tribe.
HUD representatives went over the findings in a closed-session meeting that lasted more than four hours at the Lumbee Housing Complex.
Tribal Council Vice President Sharon Hunt led the meeting in place of Tribal Speaker Steve Sampson, who was not at the meeting.
Stating that some of the issues to be discussed were “personnel-related, dealing with employee contracts … and may potentially lead to litigation,” Hunt said that the meeting had to be held in closed-session.
Members of the audience were asked to leave the council chambers and wait in the lobby. After nearly two hours, remaining audience members in the lobby were locked out of the building.
Remaining in the meeting were the council members, Tribe Chairman Purnell Swett, tribal administration attorney Ed Brooks and former tribal administrator Rose Marie Lowry-Townsend.
Lowry-Townsend’s term as tribal administrator culminated Friday at the end of her one-year contract and following a ruling by the Lumbee Supreme Court that the tribe chairman could not extend the administrator’s contract without council consent.
Lowry-Townsend’s employment was the focus of two of the complaints filed with HUD.
The first complaint concerned Lowry-Townsend’s contract, pay and severance as tribal administrator.
While the report stated that contract length and pay were matters best handled by the local Lumbee government, HUD found fault with Lowry-Townsend’s severance package, which would have required the tribe to pay the administrator twice her salary if her contract was terminated for any reason other than death or incapacitating disability with no limit on how long payments would have to be made.
The report states the agreement is not “necessary and reasonable” and “would not have been agreed to by a prudent person mindful of the responsibilities to the Tribe, tribal employees, the public at large and to the federal government.”
The second complaint addressed Lowry-Townsend’s time as consultant prior to her employment as tribal administrator.
Lowry-Townsend, whose primary job was to write a handbook for the Lumbee Tribe Boys and Girls Club, was paid at a rate of $110 per hour, totaling $30,312.48 for her services.
HUD found that Lowry-Townsend was paid without being held to a consultant contract and without efforts for proper competitive procurement, both violations prompting HUD to require the money to be reimbursed by the Lumbee Tribe.
The tribe must reimburse $69,295.19, the cost of its contract to Tiber Creek Associate, a Washington, D.C. consulting firm hired to assist with the Lumbee housing program.
HUD found that the contract was signed without a search for a competitive firm. The contract had been terminated prior to the review.
That money was part of the $245,701 spent on consulting contracts from Jan. 1, 2010, to March 31, 2011, an amount that HUD said was “of concern” and would be reviewed in-depth during the next regularly scheduled HUD review.
The report said that the tribe would have to reimburse funds spent on a trip to Las Vegas on March 11-14 for the Reservation Economic Summit that was not approved by the HUD secretary and did not contain housing-related training, as was claimed by the tribal government.
The cost of the trip, according to the report, was estimated to be at least $14,950.
Some council members complained that they did not have access to the HUD report prior to Monday’s meeting.
Council members Danita Locklear and Shelley Strickland of District 12 both said they were not given the report prior to the meeting.
Strickland and District 7 council member Larry Campbell each stepped outside during the closed-session meeting and said they were surprised by the findings.
Campbell, who was elected to the council in November, said he thought most of the other tribal council members shared his surprise.
“You can just see the disappointment on their faces,” Campbell said.
Lumbee Sovereignty Coalition 