Minneapolis Public Schools will review its credit card purchasing practices over the next 30 days, according to an internal note CEO Michael Goar sent to employees.
"The school district's policies must be obeyed and carried out by every MPS employee empowered to charge expenses on district-issued credit cards," Goar said. " For that reason, over the next 30 days, the district will continue to review our purchasing practices. We will also schedule reminder sessions for all qualified employees to assure that they understand the critical importance of following procedures, rules and regulations with regard to expenses."
In the past six months, 262 employees charged $1.5 million on district credit cards. Officials say the majority of those purchases were for necessary expenses, such as supplies and books, but thousands of dollars were also spent on food, travel and other expenses for the district's leadership team.
As of Monday morning, there were no further details about the review, including how many transactions the district will be scrutinizing.
Goar also said the finance department will "conduct an assessment to determine if additional infractions to our purchasing policy need to be more explicitly identified and reported publicly."
