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The Morgan City Housing Authority director maligned in an audit for reportedly overpaying four employees – including the director – $136,000 in one fiscal year resigned his position, leaving the MCHA board scurrying to find an interim director.
Charles Spann submitted his letter of resignation to the housing authority board on the heels of a scathing independent audit accusing him of giving exorbitant bonuses last year – in direct violation with the state’s civil service law – and poor documentation practices.
The MCHA is under federal and state civil service investigation dating back to 2007, the year Spann was hired as director, according to Victory Ho, chairman of the authority board.
Ho said he is receiving resumes for Spann’s vacated post. “But I can’t hire a new director until I get the ship right,” he said.
The right candidate, he said, will be “someone local, who knows the area and its residents.”
The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development has graded the MCHA 49, which indicates it is a troubled agency.
“Trouble is an understatement,” Ho said. “Our former director has left us in a big mess.
“I have a lot of mistrust for our former director.”
Spann reportedly paid three key MCHA staff members – Tori Johnson, Diane Pace and Sandra Greene – were paid bonuses almost equivalent to their annual salaries. Spann also gave himself a hefty bonus. All the payments were made without the MCHA’s board’s approval.
Johnson, Pace and Greene are civil service employees, who, according to Louisiana Civil Service Commission guidelines, are not eligible to receive bonuses larger than 10 percent of their annual salary.
Johnson’s annual salary in 2012 was $37,881. With the $34,185 bonus, her total pay was $72,066.
Johnson, who previously handled Section 8 cases, resigned from the MCHA in late spring because of health issues. She told the Tri-Parish Times in an earlier interview that Spann had awarded the bonuses “after proper reviews of our work.”
Pace, the resident MCHA accountant, was paid $48,131 last year. Her bonus was $46,913, making her total take home pay $95,044.
Pace refused to comment on the bonus.
Public housing manager Greene also refused to comment, telling the Tri-Parish Times, “I could explain but you know how you media are. You twist things.”
Greene’s salary was $57,831 last year. With a $56377 bonus, she was paid $114,208, according to the audit.
Spann’s self-authorized bonus was the most conservative, Ho said. In addition to his $85,000 salary, he received $22,351 in bonus pay last year. His total take-home pay was $107,351, based on the audit figures.
Spann wrote in his resignation letter that it was “a very sad day for me.”
“It is sad to end my 46-year public and housing management career in such a negative way. This letter is an apology to you, the board of commissioners, the staff and the residents for not watching over all agency operations as entrusted to me.”
Spann accepted blame for the 2012 audit’s findings, including delving out more than $136,000 of unauthorized bonus payments.
The outgoing director said renovations and the demolition of 186 vacant units diverted his attention.
“Those oversights on my part will be a topic of conversation much longer than the more than 100 units of public housing renovated, repaired and placed back on the rental market for the waiting list of low income and disabled families that is continually growing,” he wrote.
Spann’s predecessor, Wendell Bogan, who held the director job for 22 years, said he was shocked to learn of the audit’s findings.
“I just can’t imagine how the topic of all this bonus money got started, especially the bonus pay that was nearly equal to the recipient’s salary,” he said. “On my watch, no one got a bonus. However, they did receive Civil Service-approved raises.”
Bogan said he would often forgo a raise because the MCHA did not have the money. “I placed my staff first,” he said.
