The municipal government responded to veterinarian Ms. Aikaterini Stathatou with a lengthy press release posted on the municipality’s website regarding the issue highlighted by Kythera.News on February 3, 2021, titled: «The veterinarian's accrued earnings are »on hold»".
Read the press release here:
The Truth About Stray Animals in Kythira
In recent years, the Municipal Authority has been collaborating with private veterinarian Ms. Katerina Stathatou, a private veterinarian, on a regular annual basis, with the aim of ensuring the lawful management of stray animals and performing spaying and neutering procedures. To date, Ms. Stathatou has signed 5 contracts with the Municipality as follows:
- 2016: 4.500€
- 2017: 4.500€
- 2018: 7.983€
- 2019: 9.523,08€
- 2020: 10.842,56€
Of the above amounts The total amount, as well as the first invoice under the 2020 contract, in the amount of €6,460.40, has been paid to Ms. Stathatou.. For the year 2020, the second invoice, in the amount of €4,361.08, was authorized on September 15, 2020, via payment order No. 309. The authorization of an expense requires a certain amount of time before payment is made to the beneficiary, which depends on procedural issues as well as the workload of the sole employee in the treasury department, who also handles all types of collections for the Municipal Treasury. Not all of the documents required for payment were valid, so Ms. Stathatou was asked to provide new ones, as required by law. When Ms. Stathatou submitted the new supporting documents, the relevant budget line from which the expense was to be paid had already been depleted, as that specific expense is covered by own regular revenue of the Municipality, which were minimal in 2020 due to the pandemic. The responsible employee, by mistake, proceeded to reimburse Ms. Stathatou from the wrong account, resulting in Ms. Stathatou returning the money the following day, for which the responsible employee thanked her. Subsequently, even though the relevant amount was available in the own-revenue account, the municipal cashier proceeded with the payment; however, in the meantime, Ms. Stathatou’s personal social security coverage had expired. The relevant departments in Piraeus, apparently due to operating with reduced staff because of the pandemic, were very slow to issue the new certificate, and there was also telephone communication with Ms. Stathatou’s accountant in an effort to resolve the issue. Ultimately, the issuance of the tax clearance certificate was significantly delayed, resulting in the 2020 fiscal year ending and the related obligation being carried over to the 2021 budget.
It follows from the above that The Municipality had no intention of failing to pay Ms. Stathatou. Moreover, the 60% portion of her 2020 contract had already been paid, and the 40% portion that was not paid in 2020 will be paid as soon as the 2021 budget is approved21, upon presentation of all required legal documentation, of course.
We note that the Municipal Treasury has only one employee, who simultaneously handles both the payments of approximately 650 payment orders per year, as well as the collection of fees and bills and the processing of hundreds of debt settlements; consequently, although these are isolated incidents, they have occurred in the past (and not only in the Municipality of Kythira) and are well known to those who deal with public agencies.
The payment of payment orders is a task that requires the utmost care, and in carrying it out, the responsible employee bears a tremendous responsibility to ensure that all legally required supporting documents submitted to the Municipality by the beneficiaries. Making even a small payment without following the entire prescribed procedure constitutes a serious disciplinary and criminal offense; therefore, all payments areare thoroughly reviewed by both the Head of Financial Services and the Municipal Authority to ensure full compliance with the law. Moreover, it is no coincidence that The Court of Auditors has never, since 2014, annulled a payment order issued by our municipality, with the exception of two projects that had been put out to bid by the previous administration.
For the year 2021, the amount allocated for the management of stray animals is €10,000, which will be increased during the upcoming first budget revision and will be awarded through the procedure set forth in Article 118 of Law 4412/2016. If Ms. Stathatou does not wish to serve as the contractor for this service in 2021, another colleague of hers will be sought.
