By Anton Riecher
A specialized forensic audit to uncover any further misconduct in Devine Volunteer Fire Department finances during resigned fire chief Greg Atkinson’s administration was unanimously approved by the Medina County Emergency Services District No. 2 board of commissioners at a March 5, 2025 special meeting.
Urged by Sheriff Randy Brown and the Medina County Commissioners Court, the audit is estimated to cost a minimum of $20,000 for each of the three years slated for investigation. A decision is pending on whether that cost should be passed on to Devine VFD by withholding future ESD funding.
On a motion by ESD2 vice president, Jeff Howard, seconded by assistant treasurer, Jerry Stevens, the board voted 5-0 to approve the forensic audits covering three fiscal years 2022 through 2024.
ESD2 president Todd Summers addressed the capacity crowd in attendance prior to the vote.
“I’m guessing the number one reason most of y’all are here is because of some of the recent things that have happened here at the firehouse that has caused concern to our citizens,” he said.
Those recent events include a official oppression-sexual harassment charge, a misdemeanor, filed against Gregory D. Atkinson, 45, in late February 2025 and the arrest of DVFD office administrator Heather Schultz two months earlier in December 2024 on a charge of tampering with evidence related to more than $76,000 in missing funds.
Atkinson officially resigned as chief only one day before the ESD2 audit vote.
Patrick DuBose, a former volunteer Devine fire chief for 20 years (retired in 2011), preceding Atkinson and several others chiefs, dominated the discussion during the special meeting’s public forum. He reported on activities he witnessed while serving (2022-2023) as a paid assistant fire chief brought in to head up maintenance and training for the department, leaving after 13 months.
“The ESD’s budget was being utilized for things that it was not supposed to be utilized for,” Patrick DuBose said.
A decision by the board has been pending since shortly after Schultz’s arrest. Summers blamed the board’s hesitance to go for forensic audits on the major expense involved.
“Our CPA firm told us they didn’t think it was necessary, that it could be a waste of money to spend that extra money for a forensic audit when a regular audit with some special attention to particular areas would provide the data needed,” he said.
A required annual audits of the Devine VFD finances costing $9,000 is already in the works (for years 2022-23 and 2023-2024), he said. A review as done of 2021.
Board bookkeeper Nancy Pepper, who also serves as Devine ISD school board president, said a forensic audit differs from a routine audit in that it requires giving the investigating accountants some specific idea of what discrepancies the board expects to find.
“We have to give them the scope of work that they’re looking for,” Pepper said.
The open ended nature of such an investigation means the accounting firm is not able to give a maximum figure on the cost involved, Summers said. Also, the firm is in the midst of the busy tax season, meaning the forensic audit might not begin before May at earliest.
To date, Devine VFD just received a $76,023 check (on February 28) from its insurance coverage against fraudulent activity by employees, Summers said. That figure is based on documentation uncovered by Assistant Chief, Jessica Massey Martinez, now serving as interim chief following Atkinson’s departure.
The fire department’s fraudulent activity coverage is capped at $140,000 per incident, Summers said.
“It’s a struggle in our minds,” he said. “Are we going to spend $50,000 plus to find maybe some more money when we’ve already recovered $76,000?”
The ultimate responsibility of the ESD2 board in this situation also comes into question, Summers said. Emergency services district are political subdivisions like counties or school districts authorized to collect property taxes. ESD2 contracts/hires Devine VFD to provide fire protection with the tax funds it raises. The contract states certain financial reports must be shared each month between the two entities.
“We have a fiduciary responsibility to look after the funds we provide,” Summers said. “But we don’t have any authority to manage the fire department.”
Prior to the board vote, board assistant treasurer Stevens suggested that if the audit is charged to Devine VFD it should be in increments over time rather than one lump sum.
“To me, personally, this is very unfortunate for our community,” Stevens said. “As a taxpayer I don’t think what happened is right. There are some unknowns and some questions I have as a taxpayer and a board member.”
Speakers taking the floor during the public forum portion of the meeting were also unanimous in their support for the audit with former fire chief DuBose being the most vocal.
“All of this stuff that’s coming out is making me sick because of the things that we’ve all done for this department over the years,” he said.
DuBose, who recently joined the board of Medina County ESD4, served 31 years with the Devine VFD, much of it in a command role. He also enjoyed many 33 years with the San Antonio Fire Department as a career emergency fire engineer/paramedic, retiring in 2021.
Asked to return to duty with Devine VFD in a paid capacity handing maintenance and training, DuBose said he witnessed the department co-mingling ESD funds with various other accounts. Funds earmarked for maintenance were going into salaries and operation of the Devine VFD training academy.
The funds available were insufficient to sustain those activities, DuBose said.
“That’s why you have trucks that don’t run,” he said. “That’s why you’ve got equipment that’s broken down.”
Specifically, DuBose challenged the Devine VFD board on hiring of Atkinson as chief.
“He did not meet the requirements that I wrote when I was there,” DuBose said. “You had to have five years’ experience as a fire officer. He had to have 10 years’ experience as a firefighter. You had to be certified in the state of Texas as an advanced firefighter.”
Prior to the hiring of Atkinson, policies were in place that required multiple signatures on any check issued for fire department expenses, DuBose said. When he returned as a paid employee, check signing responsibilities had been handed over to one person and he told them that was wrong.
“There should be multiple eyes on what is going on,” DuBose said. “In the 1990s, honest to God, before I was fire chief here, we had somebody that stole money from the fire department. That’s when we put all those policies into place.”
About 13 months under Atkinson’s command, DuBose resigned.
“The ladies and gentlemen in this department that are protecting this area, this is not about you,” DuBose said. “It is about the (Devine VFD) board of directors who are supposed to take care of the business of the corporation and failed to do their duty.”
DuBose said he supports the ESD board in charging the cost of the forensic audit to Devine VFD.
“This board needs to go to that department and say ‘we are withdrawing those funds from your check,’” he said.
DuBose also agreed with Summers that Devine VFD, organized as a non-profit 501c3, is legally responsible for the fire department’s financial predicament, not the ESD board.
“Don’t blame the (ESD) board for what’s going on in the department,” he said. “It’s like if you hire a roofer to do your roof. You don’t have a right to look at their books. You can’t write their policies. You can’t tell them who to hire and fire.”
However, the ESD board does have responsibility to require Devine VFD to maintain the financial records required under its contract, DuBose said.
“Your job is to say, ‘You follow the contract or we’re not giving you a check,’” he said. “Y’all wrote the check and handed it to them without the financial reports. Please stop just handing over checks.”
“Beyond conducting the audit, the ESD board needs to decide whether it is going to continue paying for fire protection as a contracting entity or if it needs to take direct charge of the equipment and facilities to provide that fire protection,” DuBose said. “The ESD owns the building and all the equipment, as it was paid for with tax dollars.”
“You (ESD Board) can hire a qualified chief,” he said. “It’s done elsewhere.”
In the meantime, the ESD board needs to attend Devine VFD operational meetings to gain a better understanding of what is going on, DuBose said.
Others attending spoke out of their direct knowledge of Devine VFD issues. Devine bookkeeper Cynthia Sultenfuss told the board that Schultz brought her laptop computer complete with bookkeeping software to Sultenfuss in July 2023 for help with the fire department accounts.
“I told her it was a disaster,” she said. “She had to go back to the beginning of the fiscal year and make sure she was reconciling every single month and everything that matches. I called the chief and told him that nothing was right about this. And he put me off.”
Later, Sultenfuss said she learned that Schultz used Sultenfuss’s official tax identification number to make it appear she had prepared the records.
David Ehlinger, a former DVFD board president, said he had previously brought allegations regarding financial mismanagement at Devine VFD to Summers’ attention. “Todd you say you wouldn’t get involved unless it was criminal or immoral, well look where we are today I think we are past that”.
Ehlinger pointed out that many families have been donating money and volunteering their time to keep the fire department going to protect the community, generation after generation for almost 100 years, standing on the shoulder of those who went before them. (The department was started in 1929).
“Fiduciary responsibilities go beyond ‘Oh, ask a CPA to come up here and tell us what we need to do,’” he said. “If you don’t do this audit to the extreme it’s going to be repeated and it will be on your watch.”
Devine resident Kandace Ehlinger, formerly associated with Devine VFD as a volunteer/auxiliary member since 2018, said many volunteers simply have little to no experience in bookkeeping.
“It has resulted in something where it was easy to have theft,” she said. “It was an environment. I would say it was longstanding where it was ripe for some to just come in.”
A forensic audit may be expensive but necessary “to send a message that this stuff is really important,” she said.
Devine resident, Heather Yanta, said the audit might be needed to restore faith in the Devine VFD.
“If we don’t trust them to handle money, how do we trust them to really train these young people and do it right?” she said.
Former county commissioner Jerry Beck, also a recent addition to the ESD4 board, took the opportunity to thank the ESD2 board for its leadership role in approving a homestead tax exemption for the disabled and over 65.
With regard to the proposed audit, Beck said, “I like audits”.
Summers indicated that further discussion on charging the audit to the Devine VFD could be expected in the future. ESD2 board’s next regular meeting is scheduled for 7 p.m. on March 18 at the fire station.