South Fulton’s City Council has called for a forensic audit of Mayor khalid kamau’s spending after concerns arose about his use of a city purchasing card and the extent of his travel at taxpayer expense.
The concerns and questions also led the City Council to suspend international travel for city officials, with council members noting that the mayor used his card for a trip to Africa and that the city has no policy for taxpayer-funded international travel.
Councilwoman Helen Willis said the City Council directed staff to develop a policy under which the mayor and council members would have to get international trips approved by the body before they happen.
Spokesman Shaheen Solomon said the city also has hired Bambo Sonaike CPA to provide weekly audits and monthly reports to top city officials on the use of the purchasing cards, known as P-cards, and the firm Baker Tilly to perform an in-depth review of the city’s purchasing card program.
“We are spending a lot of money on P-cards,” City Manager Sharon Subadan said at a council meeting last week, adding that 57 people have P-cards in a city with 600 employees. “I recognize that there’s been a lot of concern, and the concern is justified.”
The city also plans to hire its own procurement and compliance officer.
In his first media interview on the subject, kamau told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution on Thursday that the criticism of his spending is politically motivated.
“All of this is really just political mudslinging,” said kamau, who does not capitalize his names and is in the process of legally changing his name to Kobi. “Councilwoman Willis has decided to start her campaign for mayor by dragging our entire city through the mud.”
Credit: NYT
Credit: NYT
Willis said she does not plan to run for mayor in November, adding that either way it’s irrelevant to the issue at hand.
“This is not about political posturing,” she said Thursday. “He feels like the rules don’t apply to him.”
Willis is one of several council members who filed a lawsuit in 2023 seeking to remove kamau from office, alleging that he recorded closed-door executive sessions for his “personal benefit.”
P-cards have a history of misuse in metro Atlanta, notably in the city of Atlanta and DeKalb County. A probe into P-card use by DeKalb commissioners prompted state lawmakers to make P-card abuse a felony in 2016.
An investigation by the AJC and Channel 2 Action News revealed in 2018 that former Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed used more than $50,000 from his personal and campaign bank accounts to repay taxpayers for charges he made on his city-issued credit card.
In South Fulton, questions surrounding kamau’s P-card usage have been reported on previously by news outlets including Channel 2, Fox 5 Atlanta and Atlanta News First.
On Thursday, Willis said the South Fulton City Council has asked an attorney to represent the body in filing a complaint against kamau with a city ethics board. The attorney could not be reached for comment.
Kamau confirmed Thursday that he went on a 21-day trip to Ghana, in West Africa, beginning in December, and that he traveled abroad to Columbia twice last year, including once in October, using city funds for all three trips. But he said he was invited by officials and businesses on those trips and that he was looking for investment opportunities that would benefit South Fulton.
“All of these trips were about promoting South Fulton, which is the Blackest city in America, as a hub of commerce and trade for the African diaspora,” kamau said.
Asked on Friday whether he secured any economic agreements that could benefit South Fulton while he was abroad last year, kamau replied in a text that he “brought back several Sister Cities agreements from Colombia” but that City Council “has thus far refused to vote to ratify them.”
He said he spent only $7,000 on the trip to Ghana, staying with friends and hosts while he was there.
“I turned down $1,000 of per diem for the trip,” he said.
Kamau said he also had planned to travel to Ethiopia last year but canceled the trip, and noted that some city council members also have traveled abroad, though he said he was not calling into question their spending on those trips.
Councilwoman Natasha Williams-Brown acknowledged Thursday that she and other council members discovered during a retreat in January that they themselves were not complying with city policy for using P-cards. That is because they didn’t realize that the policy still stated that they had to have the city manager approve their travel, Williams-Brown said.
Williams-Brown and Willis, as well as kamau, said they were not comfortable stating exactly how much the mayor spent in the third quarter of 2024. Fox 5 Atlanta put the amount at $26,000.
Kamau said the city’s plans to audit his spending are too narrow.
“If we’re really serious about doing a forensic audit,” he said, “we need to do that for the entire city beginning where we spend the money most, in multimillion dollar contracts, not thousand-dollar, hundred-dollar tickets for a council member.”
He said he will be saying more in coming days about his deliberations on whether he’ll run for a second term as mayor.
On Monday, kamau said he’s inviting the public to come see his newly renovated office, which is opening at noon, and to hear about his vision for the future of South Fulton. He said people can visit his website, Kobicares.com, where he will release additional details about his spending on Friday, including who invited him on trips and who he met with while abroad.
“I really am a pretty frugal guy,” he said.
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