Local government needs fiscal oversight, treasury candidate says

Associated Press

COLUMBIA -- A candidate for state treasurer says local governments need more state oversight in handling taxpayer money.

Republican Rick Quinn said he would create a government finance review system similar to one now working in North Carolina if he wins the office.

He said citizens would get detailed insight into what elected officials agree to spend and borrow, and those local leaders also would get advice and expertise from the state.

Local governments spend more than $12 billion yearly, Quinn said.

Because there is a lack of coordination and "unsound financial practices ... local government can waste a tremendous amount of taxpayer dollars," Quinn said.

The proposal "really does slap the face of local auditors and treasurers," said Trav Robertson, spokesman for state Treasurer Grady Patterson.

Quinn said the oversight is not an effort to undermine home rule, which gives local governments authority to handle their own affairs.

Quinn said the program would cost about $500,000, but that could come from reorganizing operations within the treasurer's office.

"There's no way," Robertson said. "You're going to have to create an entire new bureaucratic arm of state government to do that." North Carolina has an agency devoted to the effort, Robertson said.

Quinn, a former House majority leader, faces Senate Transportation Committee Chairman Greg Ryberg of Aiken and Easley home builder Jeffrey S. Willis in the June 13 primary.

The winner faces Patterson, who has no primary opposition.