Bubba O’Keefe is in place to be the new Coahoma County Tourism executive director in January 2019 and the board is once again full with five members with the appointment of Madge Howell, but there are still unanswered questions going back to February.
O’Keefe was present at the tourism board’s Dec. 12 meeting and sat in the audience. Board attorney Ed Peacock and board member Bill Gresham, also an attorney, are working on O’Keefe’s contract that will come before the board to approve.
O’Keefe succeeds Kappi Allen, who resigned as director in late February. Allen is still being investigated for alleged misappropriated funds by Penn Mills of the State Auditor’s office.
Peacock reported he spoke with Mills recently.
“The statement is, ‘There’s no further update, it’s no change’ and he can’t provide any other information,” Peacock said. “I said, ‘What is the anticipated closure date on it?’ He said. ‘That’s all I could say.’”
“Is there any way we could get that in writing, just so we could let that be known to the public,” Howell replied.
Peacock said having something in writing would help with issues on some of the tourism office’s bills.
“I said, ‘Penn, could you please just put in writing that you all are doing an investigation of an alleged misappropriation or something like that?’”
Peacock said Mills told him he would have to talk with his boss.
“That’s not asking a whole lot,” Howell said.
Board chair Al Jones suggedted inviting Mills to the board meeting in January and putting him on the agenda to speak.
“If I was you, I would call him this week and maybe that will push our situation,” Peacock said to Jones. “I really thought that we would have closure, hopefully, by the end of the year.”
Peacock said when Mills makes his report, it has to go to several different people for approval.
“They don’t take just his (report),” Peacock said. “They may want him to do something additional.”
Peacock said he does not know if Mills has done all of his interviews and he may be in the final stages.
“I understand they can’t disclose anything other than they’re working,” Howell said. “That’s what we would like, something saying, ‘We are working on that.’”
Peacock said he asked for something in an email.
For the most part, Peacock said the board is caught up with its bills.
“Verizon and Amazon are on hold,” he said. “We made the final payment of TCM bank.”
Peacock said, unless there is a surprise bill, the board is where it should be with everything. He did note there was a surprise with the Mississippi Delta Tourism Association bill before.
Peacock said the audit went back to 2014 when the Clarksdale/Coahoma County Chamber of Commerce and the tourism association split.
He did say the investigator talked with chamber representatives.
“The Chamber assured me everything was in order (when it split with the tourism association),” Peacock said.
