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Taylor Releases Urbancrest Community Improvement Corporation Audit

Construction contractor owes organization more than $119,000 for unfinished work

Tuesday, December 9, 2008

Columbus -

Auditor of State Mary Taylor today released the audit of the Urbancrest Community Improvement Corporation (UCIC) for calendar years 2005 and 2006.  The audit reveals that a construction company owes Urbancrest $119,425 for partially completed work.

Subsequent to calendar year 2006, the UCIC entered into multiple contracts with a Columbus based construction company, the McPherson Group, for the creation of a master plan, the purchase of a modular structure and construction work on a building.  The McPherson Group only completed a portion of the construction and the other contracted services were not fulfilled.  The UCIC did not pay the entire contract amount, however a part of the contract totaling $119,425 was paid to the company.  The audit states that the McPherson Group must refund $119,425 to UCIC.

The owner of the McPherson group, Christopher Keifer, has also been charged with bilking several banks and companies out of hundreds of thousands of dollars while operating the McPherson group. 

In addition, the audit shows that UCIC did not maintain adequate records to document donations made to the mayor’s special events fund or to support UCIC general expenses.  UCIC was initially declared “unauditable”, or unable to be audited due to missing or incomplete financial records, on June 15, 2007. 

A copy of the full audit is available online at http://www.auditor.state.oh.us/AuditSearch/Reports/2008/Urbancrest_Community_Improvement_Corporation_06-Franklin.pdf