Bradenton Beach commissioners Feb. 19 directed their current city attorney to send a “demand” letter to their former city attorney after an audit found $28,000 in questionable charges in a nine-month block invoice.
Story Files:
- Perry Augello Memo image
- Perry Original Invoices Jan-Sept 2025
- Perry Internal Audit Invoices Jan -Sept 2025
City attorney Erica Augello said the issue surfaced shortly after she was hired by the city to succeed former city attorney Ricinda Perry, who resigned last September.
“When I first was retained by the city, one of the issues that came up was that Ms. Perry had done basically a block invoice for services from January through her resignation in September,” Augello said.
“It was for quite a substantial amount of money,” Augello said, referring to the $167,674 bill from Perry.
A prior engagement agreement with the city required Perry to submit monthly invoices.
Perry, however, submitted an Excel workbook Oct. 23, 2025, for nine months of services — January 2025-September 2025 — according to a memorandum from Augello, who said city staff conducted an audit of Perry’s billing.
“The engagement agreement drafted by Ms. Perry specifically said that she would get her invoices done monthly, and then they would be paid monthly,” Augello said. “That was not done in this case.”
Augello said the city has legal standing to contest the invoices: “From a purely legal perspective, I think the city is on good footing with saying you’re not responsible for paying those invoices because she’s in breach of her own contract … that she drafted.”
Perry’s final billing totaled $167,674. The city audit reduced that amount to $139,685, a difference of $27,989.
Augello said concerns extend beyond the timing of the invoices to the billing entries themselves.
Commissioners cited audit findings that billing entries exceeded the number of hours in a single day.
“It amazed me that someone would send an invoice out for having spent 26.1 hours in a day,” Commissioner Scott Bear said. “I’m an engineer. So, math is math, and that math never added up.”
Vice Mayor Debbie Scaccianoce said the audit findings were troubling.
“I guess I’m alarmed at the audit and how much money it was, how that billing turned out,” Scaccianoce said. “It’s disappointing because you put your faith in your city attorney to represent the city and do the right thing, and then this happens.”
Augello described the issue as a contract matter.
“I want you to keep in mind that this is a contract just like you would have with anyone else,” she said. “You can always take into (account) extenuating circumstances, but they need to be the same things that you would take into account with any other service that you had in your professional service or any other contract that the city would have.”
Under the agreement between Perry and the city, unpaid invoices more than 30 days past billing accrue interest at 12% per year.
Commissioners directed Augello to authorize payment to Perry of the audited September amount — $23,782 — but to invite negotiation on the disputed fees.
By consensus, commissioners authorized Augello to send the demand letter to Perry.
Perry on Feb. 20 commented via text to The Islander, saying she had corresponded with city treasurer Shayne Thompson, seeking collection of the unpaid invoices.
“My invoices were submitted over 100 days ago,” she wrote. “There has been no communication as to any issue with my final invoices now for over 120 days, so I am unaware of any potential problems. While none of my time is in any way conditioned upon such reimbursement and the city is well beyond their contractually allotted timeframe to object, as I have done for the last twenty years, I am always happy to assist the city should they so request.”
Perry also suggested in her Feb. 20 text that the city seek Federal Emergency Management Agency reimbursement for her hurricane-related work.
The next commission meeting will be at 6 p.m., Thursday, March 5, at city hall, 107 Gulf Drive N.