From Staff Reports

While authorities are not at liberty to discuss details, investigative reporters at the Asheville Citizen-Times continued efforts in March to uncover why former County Manager Dr. Wanda Greene is under federal investigation.

 The latest foray explored temporarily unsealed court documents pertaining to procurement cards. The cards are considered helpful for EMS and utility workers who need an item while they are out on a call. For instancce, it is easier to drive to Lowe’s and purchse something than to submit a purchase order and wait for approvals. 

The county imposes caps on purchase card expenditures, but they may be lifted at the request of a department director, and the limits were increased for Greene’s assistants.

The Citizen-Times’ probe is calling into question thousands of dollars in p-card purchases by office administrators at lifestyle stores. The latest disclosure found that the p-card issued to an assistant to the former county manager, Tiffiny Mila White, was used to purchase gift cards. 

A paper trail of emails indicated that White had been acting under the county manager’s direction, the AC-T reported.Greene told White the gift cards were for reimbursing the county commissioners for supplies, but none of the commissioners claim any knowledge about the supplies or cards. Investigators do not know what happened to the cards, either.

Within a week, White’s p-card was used to purchase six $500 gift cards from Walmart, seven $250 cards from Office Depot, seven $250 cards from Staples, and seven $250 cards from Target. 

White and another assistant, Rachel Norton, said the former county manager had and frequently used their p-card numbers as well; cards assigned to the two were used for a total of $84,000 in purchases over a 40-month period.

White’s and Norton’s cards were canceled a week before Greene retired, corresponding with the timing in CFO Tim Flora’s report that the county began locking down access and preserving evidence as soon as internal controls had detected a potential breach.

Greene ceased to have a county-issued procurement card in 2011 and instead filed for reimbursements.

With or without the card, she would typically incur tens of thousands of dollars in annual expenses. There is no record of why Greene ceased to have a county-issued card.

The Citizen-Times also looked into Greene’s expenses when she did have a credit card.