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Bell, California, Accounting Firm Audits `Rubberstamp,' Controller Says

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Audits of Bell, California, the city that paid its former manager almost $800,000 a year, were

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a “rubberstamp” by its accounting firm, state Controller John Chiang said after an review.

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Mayer Hoffman McCann PC’s Irvine, California, office failed to follow “generally accepted

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fieldwork audit standards,” said Chiang, whose office last month found the city unlawfully spent at least $710,000 in state and federal funds. Eight current and former officials were

arrested and charged with misappropriating public funds in September. City Manager Robert Rizzo and two other officials resigned July 22 after the Los Angeles Times reported that they were paid a collective $1.6 million annually. Bell is a town of 36,000 people south of Los Angeles in which one in four residents lives below the poverty line, according to the Census Bureau. Mayer Hoffman “appears to have been a rubberstamp rather than a responsible auditor committed to providing the public with the transparency and accountability that could have prevented the mismanagement of the city’s finances,” Chiang, a Democrat, said in a statement yesterday. “We were very offended by the tone of their press release,” Joe Cravelli, a spokesman for the accounting firm, said in a telephone interview. ‘Massive Scheme’