State auditors chastised Sykesville for not providing financial records for the stalled Warfield business park, for which the state loaned the park?s governing group $4 million.
“There?s no accountability,” said Tom Barnackel, the state?s deputy legislative auditor. “I think they owe it to their citizens.”
The Warfield complex, which officials hope will be the county?s largest economic development in years, is governed by the nonprofit Warfield Development Corp., separate from the town. It received loans and grants for $2.5 million from Carroll County and $500,000 from Sykesville, said Matt Candland, the town manager.
Sykesville Mayor Jonathan Herman said the audit requirement is a technicality.
“It?s a classification; it doesn?t really mean anything,” Herman said. “Anything associated with the town has to be audited, but WDC is a separate entity, and because money passes through the town, [state officials] want it to be audited.”
The Warfield group submitted financial statements for the audit year, fiscal 2006, with next year?s projections to the state?s Department of Business and Economic Development in June, more than a month late, said Brad Rees, head of the Warfield group. The state came back and asked for tax returns, which the group submitted about a month ago, he said.
DBED officials were not aware of the audit, spokeswoman Karen Glenn Hood said.
Barnackel said the Warfield group?s records should be submitted with Sykesville because five of the group?s nine members were appointed by the town.
Town officials insisted the group is independent from Sykesville.
“It?s something that will be resolved at some point, but we don?t see it as a problem,” Herman said.
Warfield Development did not respond to a request for financial records relating to the project.
THE WARFIELD SITE
In 1995, Sykesville took over from the state the 570,000-square-foot complex, a former psychiatric hospital on Route 32 appraised at $11 million.
