Auditor finds ‘credible evidence’ that Lafayette County firm committed Medicaid fraud
Missouri Auditor Nicole Galloway said Wednesday her office found “credible” evidence that a Lafayette County firm double billed for counseling services and referred allegations of potential Medicaid fraud to the state Attorney General’s office for possible criminal charges.
Galloway’s office opened an investigation this fall after receiving whistleblower complaints about the Lafayette County Children’s Services Fund, a sales-tax-supported agency that provides counseling and other mental health services for kids and teens.
One of the complaints concerned payments to The Center for Counseling and Training, a private firm in Odessa, Missouri owned by Theresa Dotson Alexander. One or more whistleblowers accused Alexander of billing both the Lafayette County Children’s Services fund and the state’s Medicaid program for the same services.
“An investigation by the state auditor’s office included hundreds of pages of documentation and found these allegations to be credible,” Galloway’s office said in a statement.
Galloway’s referral hit Alexander by surprise when The Star contacted her Wednesday afternoon.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” she said in a Facebook message. She did not reply after a reporter then shared Galloway’s news release with her.
The Star reported in October about concerns over how the Lafayette County Children’s Services Fund had been managed. County voters passed a one-eighth of a cent sales tax in 2005 that raises roughly $300,000 each year.
Overseen by a board of volunteers, the agency had no paid staff until 2016, and only in 2017 did the fund begin requiring detailed accounting of how its money was being spent by school districts and other organizations that received it.
“There was no accountability,” Mike Robinson, a one-time consultant to the children’s services fund, told The Star in October. “Nobody knew or was willing to say where the money went.”
The article cited a number of issues and questionable practices, including funding for services that were not part of the agency’s mission. In one such instance it provided money to support a summer lunch program for kids at the Community Christian Center of Wellington, Missouri.
The fund also appeared to have broken state law by having members of its board of directors with ties to school districts that received money from the fund to pay vendors like Alexander, which is a potential conflict of interest.
In her news release, Galloway did not address those other issues surrounding the children’s services fund.
She singled out the Medicaid fraud allegation as “requiring immediate attention” and said she applauded the whistleblowers for alerting her office.
Galloway said she directed her referral to the attorney general’s Medicaid Fraud Control Unit and informed the Medicaid Audit and Compliance United at the state’s Department of Social Services.
Eight other Missouri counties have established children’s services funds since 2004, including Jackson and Clay counties. Lafayette County’s agency has the smallest budget.
This story was originally published December 11, 2019 at 3:51 PM.
