City officially rejects workforce payments

Last edited 2:03 p.m., Feb. 21, 2025 [Editor's note: This story has been updated to clarify that the Workforce Development Board, not the city, had not met payment requirements and maintains a Community Foundation of the Ozarks fund.]

The city of Springfield will not pay requests submitted by the Ozark Region Workforce Development Board to compensate an independent consultant hired by the board. 

Recent Springfield Business Journal reporting quoted an official from the city’s Finance Department, Assistant Director Jody Vernon, as saying payment of the bills was not anticipated. Yesterday, city spokesperson Cora Scott forwarded to SBJ a memo clarifying that the payment, totaling $27,900, would not be made.

The memo from interim City Manager Collin Quigley was directed to Bob Dixon, chair of the Council of Local Elected Officials; Andrea Sitzes, chair of the ORWDB; and members of the CLEO and board. The memo is dated Feb. 19. 

The city serves as fiscal agent in the administration of U.S. Department of Labor Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act funds. 

In the memo, Quigley states that the city engaged accounting firm Forvis Mazars LLP to review the payment requests as a third-party compliance consultant. He said the auditor shared concerns of the fiscal agent in concluding that the board did not follow federal, state and ORWDB procurement requirements. 

“Accordingly, the city, as fiscal agent, does not believe that this payment request can be paid with WIOA funds without exposing the CLEO to liability for payment,” Quigley writes. 

Quigley attached the Forvis Mazars analysis that outlined 16 requirements for payment and found the board had met only 10 of them. Among the deficits were a failure to define evaluation factors and their relative importance in the request for proposals and a failure to require and receive sealed bids. 

The last meeting of the WDB was held Feb. 5, and it was adjourned without action on several agenda items. The nonpayment matter was cited as the reason the board could not move forward. 

Some of those agenda items are being taken up in a special meeting called for today at 3 p.m. via Zoom. 

Old business on the agenda includes a vote on the three invoices denied by the city. The board has a fund composed of contributions and donations at Community Foundation of the Ozarks Inc. that does not require the same procurement process for use. 

The board also is expected to vote on issuing a request for proposals to provide recommendations to the CLEO for agreements regarding administrative services, one-stop operator (Job Center), fiscal agent and youth services. These four areas are currently managed through agreements with the city of Springfield. 

The agreements themselves – due to expire at the end of February – are also up for a vote, as is renewal of a routine firewall policy that applies to the board, the fiscal agent and other entities.