Who controls $8 million
of Navajo vets’ money?

By John Christian Hopkins
Dine Bureau

WINDOW ROCK — The Human Services Committee wants clarification about the usage and management of the $8 million the Council appropriated for Navajo chapter veterans during the March 21 special session.

“This money is for our Navajo veterans,” explained Delegate Young Jeff Tom, who sponsored the legislation.

“This money will benefit our veterans at the grassroots level. This is what I had in mind as we prepared the budget for this development.”

There is also confusion over who is in charge of the money.

Council Delegate Elbert R. Wheeler said that there is a lot of confusion who should manage the money for the veterans.

The Local Governance Support Center believes it should be the ones that should manage the money, Delegate Larry Noble said.

The $8 million for veterans was part of a $17 million spending package that Council passed, overriding the veto of Navajo President Joe Shirley Jr.

Shirley had asked the Council to approve $1 million to help chapters with weather-related damages, but Council proceeded to tack on several other spending bills. The money was to come from a grant reserve fund that Council had set aside last year.

Decrying the Council’s frequent tactic of adding unrelated spending amendments to emergency legislation, Shirley vetoed the measure.

The veterans’ funds will aid vets from all 110 chapters.
The money was allocated to the chapters at 50 percent equal distribution and 50 percent by registered voters. This distribution formula was calculated by using registered Navajo voters as of Jan. 24, 2008.

He had to comply with the Navajo Appropriations Act, which resulted in using the method of the 50/50 appropriations formula, Tom explained.

Some of the Human Services Committee members requested the clarification because they felt there was confusion among the public regarding the money.
Ultimately, the fund management should be done by the individual chapters, because they are the ones that received the disbursement of funds, Tom said.

There is also a misunderstanding that Speaker Lawrence T. Morgan’s office is controlling the money.

“That is not true,” said the speaker’s press liaison, Joshua Lavar Butler. “The Speaker’s office has no control over the money that was appropriated to the chapter veterans.”

“The money was appropriated to all 110 chapters and the money has already been disbursed to them, because that is where all the veterans’ organizations are established,” said Laura Calvin, the financial advisor with the Speaker’s office. “The money is now available for use.”

The management of the money needs to occur at the chapter level, because that is where the money was disbursed, Morgan said.

“The management of the funds needs to be done through a collaborative effort between the Navajo chapters and the veterans’ organizations,” Morgan said. “A financial management system is already established at the chapters for accountability.”

Some chapters are being told that a budget will need to be created and this will manage how the chapters will use the veterans’ funds.

Chapters without a veterans’ organization will still need to develop a budget for the usage of the funds, Calvin said.
“The money is there for the veterans at the chapter level,” Calvin added. “The chapters need to work to get their Developing a budget is the prudent practice for such funds, according to Principal Auditor Helen Brown, the auditor general’s office.

Brown agreed with Morgan that most chapters — if not all — have financial managements systems in place through the Five Management System and typically, these FMS policies and procedures require the chapters to develop and adopt a budget for all funds they receive.

“The chapters’ budget process should ensure the goals and needs of the local veterans’ organizations are met with the funds appropriated to the chapters,” Brown said. “In terms of our audits — since the funds were disbursed to the chapters — we will regard the chapters as the administrators of these funds and with that comes the responsibility for providing assurance that the veterans’ funds were used for their intended purposes.”

“Our intent was to provide the much-needed funds to our Navajo veterans,” Morgan explained. “Our local veterans should be the ones to benefit from this allocation of $8 million to meet the needs at their local communities — local veterans’ organizations should know their own local needs.”

Information: Joshua Lavar Butler, Office of the Speaker, (928) 871-6384.

John Christian Hopkins can be reached at Hopkins1960@hotmail.com