Last week ECHO announced, then, Executive Director Tenbarge was stepping down. On Friday we learned the former director used ECHO funds to pay taxes on personally owned properties.

Kelley Coures with the Department of Metropolitan Development says the city uses a check reimbursement system when distributing federal funds. Additionally, the federal government tracks where the dollars go, “HUD requires us to not only pay the claims based on reimbursable but then once a year my staff, three people from my staff, go to an agency like ECHO and they make sure their books match our books,” said Course.

The last time the city checked its records with ECHO was in October 2017 and everything matched up. ECHO provides housing and assistance to people in economic crisis. Going forward the Department of Metro Development says it will continue to work with interim director Chris Metz.

Evansville Police say there is no criminal investigation into Tenbarge’s alleged actions at this time.