LeChee political foes launch dueling audit calls

 

A n unsuccessful candidate for LeChee Chapter president who alleged election abuses called last week for an audit of LeChee Chapter  - a few days after the chapter manager called for an investigation of the chapter Veterans Oversight Committee, which the candidate chairs.

Nathan Kilgore showed the Navajo Times a copy of a letter he said he hand-carried last Wednesday to the Navajo Nation's auditor general, attorney general and Ethics and Rules Committee.

In it, he states the chapter has not been following protocol for disbursements and needs to be audited.

Among other things, Kilgore alleged, chapter manager Herman Tso often has a subordinate, the office specialist, write checks without the approval of the chapter.

Kilgore said his call for a chapter audit was in response to Tso's Nov. 18 request at a chapter meeting to have the veterans committee investigated. A letter from Tso to chapter officials said there had been "a number of complaints, questions, audit requests, etc., arising from the allocations and expenditures of LeChee Chapter veteran funds."

Kilgore had responded that he welcomed an audit, but would want to see all chapter funds audited, not just the veterans' account.

The chapter agreed to host a meeting between Kilgore's committee, the Tuba City Local Governance Support Center, and the director of the Tuba City office of Navajo Veterans Affairs to develop corrective action plans for the committee.

Kilgore says his committee is running just fine, there's no missing money and no need for a corrective action plan.

He said the suggestion to investigate his committee was in retaliation for a recent separate complaint he filed with the Navajo Board of Election Supervisors, naming, among others, Tso's sister-in-law, Margie Tso.

Kilgore alleged Margie Tso, vice president of LeChee's land-use planning committee, which Kilgore also heads, held an illegal meeting to allocate money the day before the election. Meanwhile, her husband was running for chapter vice president (he lost).

Margie Tso countered that she had not been informed the meeting was canceled, and chaired it in Kilgore's place when he didn't show up.

The election board dismissed the complaint, but Kilgore said he will appeal it to the Navajo Nation Supreme Court.

Margie Tso has also accused Kilgore of taking a $4,000 grant from the veterans committee. Kilgore says he's a veteran and qualifies for the money, and recused himself from the vote when the matter came up. He said both Margie and Herman Tso have obtained money from the committee on behalf of relatives who are veterans.

"All this money is allocated in public meetings," he said. "Those people had every opportunity to say no at the committee level and then at the chapter level."

Herman Tso did not return a phone call Monday.

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