COLUMBIA, S.C. (QUEEN CITY NEWS) — South Carolina leaders released a 69-page report Wednesday putting an end to how $1.8 billion mysteriously ended up a state bank account.
After a nearly year-long investigation, the staggering amount stems from the state transitioning from one accounting system to another over four years, and committee members say the “missing” $1.8 billion stemmed from the two-phase conversion. They were combining different records that helped the state Treasurer’s office match the state Enterprise Information System staff to the individual bank accounts.
During those phases, the state Treasurer’s office and the state Information System staff were supposed to make the balances from the two separate systems agree. At the end of the bank conversion, the sum of the cash balance in those funds would be zero.
But, the Treasurer’s part of the conversion didn’t go as planned, and funds ultimately accumulated the $1.8 billion cash balance.
“There is no missing or stolen money,” Gov. Henry McMaster said in a statement. “The funds do not exist. It also confirms that there were unintended accounting mistakes made by different parties involved in state government’s transition from an old accounting system to the new accounting system.”
The report says approximately $1.6 billion of the $1.8 billion is the result of incorrect journal entries recorded during phase 2 of the conversion process. The remaining funds are already included in the reported bank balances of the Treasurer’s office.
