<html><head><meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"></head><body dir="auto"><div style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;">No need to fret none, V-Peeps.</div><div style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"><br></div><div style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;">Butch'll simply cut education and Medicaid to make up for this oversight.</div><div style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"><br></div><div style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;">Courtesy of today's (February 1, 2014) Spokesman-Review.</div><div style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"><br></div><div style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;">----------------------------------</div><div><div id="story-body" style="overflow: visible !important;"><h1 style="margin: 0px 0px 10px; clear: both; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%; line-height: 1.2; font-size: 28px; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; color: rgb(17, 17, 17);">Idaho treasurer’s ‘inappropriate transfers’ could cost $27 million</h1><p style="margin-bottom: 21px; overflow: visible !important;"><span style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">BOISE – State Treasurer Ron Crane’s office made inappropriate transfers that cost taxpayers $10.2 million, but the hit to public funds could rise to $27 million, according to an audit that concluded Idaho’s money manager overrode internal controls meant to contain financial risks.</span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 21px; overflow: visible !important;"><span style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Legislative auditors said in a report Crane’s office should strengthen measures designed to keep Idaho from losing money. Following its release, lawmakers Friday also called for new oversight on grounds Crane now has too much authority to shift investments without guidance of others.</span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 21px; overflow: visible !important;"><span style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">The losses result from investments in mortgage-backed securities hit by the housing bubble’s collapse. Crane shifted these investments between accounts in 2009, exposing state taxpayers to the risk, auditors say.</span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 21px; overflow: visible !important;"><span style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Crane’s office “inappropriately transferred investments … resulting in a disproportionate share of investment losses incurred by the state,” according to the report issued by April Renfro, a certified public accountant who oversees Idaho’s Legislative Audits Division.</span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 21px; overflow: visible !important;"><span style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">What’s more, auditors wrote, Crane’s office still oversees $2.9 billion in the accounts hit by the losses, “without the aid of independent oversight to review investment activity and to ensure fiduciary duties have been considered.”</span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 21px; overflow: visible !important;"><span style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Crane, a four-term treasurer whose management has drawn fire from auditors in the past, including spending thousands on limousines during trips to New York, didn’t immediately return a phone call Friday.</span></p></div></div><div style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;">----------------------------------</div><div style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"><br><div><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Seeya 'round town, Moscow, because . . .</span></div><div><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"><br></span></div><div><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">"Moscow Cares" (the most fun you can have with your pants on)</span></div><div><a href="http://www.moscowcares.com/" style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"><font color="#000000">http://www.MoscowCares.com</font></a></div><div><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"> </span></div><div><div><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Tom Hansen</span></div><div><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Moscow, Idaho</span></div></div><div><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"><br></span></div><div><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">"There's room at the top they are telling you still.</span></div><div><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">But first you must learn to smile as you kill,</span></div><div><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">If you want to be like the folks on the hill."</span></div><div><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"><br></span></div><div><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">- John Lennon</span></div><div><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"> </span></div></div></body></html>