Editorial: Restoring faith in city's audits

It is a question of trust.

In a time of growing public cynicism, government doesn't help its cause by keeping reports secret, especially when they're government audits. But that was the situation that had been occurring at Las Vegas City Hall. Critics point out that since 1996 more than a dozen city audit reports had not been made public.

In addition to a lack of openness, another important issue is to whom the city auditor should report: the city manager -- the person whose performance may be audited -- or an outside group independent of the city manager? Obviously having an auditor report to the city manager alone doesn't foster confidence in the independence of the reports.

But all of this may soon change for the better. The Las Vegas City Council voted Monday to ask the 1999 Legislature to change the city's charter. The city auditor would report to the council or a committee established by the council, instead of the city manager. As it stands now, when the auditor makes a report, either the city manager or a deputy city manager must sign off on it before it's made public. That establishes a potential for abuse, where audits carrying "bad news" might be withheld from the public.

The irony in all this is that the City Council is proposing to make virtually the same recommendations made by Las Vegas City Auditor Susan Toohey, who was fired without explanation earlier this year. The Sun reported that a number of audit recommendations made by Toohey hadn't been acted on promptly. And Toohey felt there was an inherent conflict in the city manager having the authority to fire audit division employees.

There's already enough antagonism directed at public agencies without government providing critics with unnecessary ammunition. Government should do everything reasonable to foster an environment that promotes openness and an unflinching eye to ferret out inefficiencies which, if discovered and corrected, should lead to better government.

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