MACON, Ga. — Little Richard's childhood home in Pleasant Hill is now a house divided.
Like many disagreements, it's about money. In this case, it's a broken contract between The Macon-Bibb Community Enhancement Authority and the county. The authority is supposed to manage the house, but now they say they're done with it — just a couple of months after the county decided they were done with something, too.
"Finally in December of 2023, we had enough of that," Mayor Lester Miller said, explaining what happened when the county sent a letter to the enhancement authority telling them they were not in compliance with their agreement.
Miller says the authority did not complete the required yearly audits for three years. Macon-Bibb County chips in $96,000 each year to run the house as a community resource center.
"We've asked for audits on each year. And they got continuances and they had some problems with the auditing company, so we gave them a little extension," Miller said.
The authority's board chairman, Bruce Riggins, doesn't dispute that. He says the county's decision to enforce it and cut funding came abruptly.
"We wanted to work with the county in order to move forward," Riggins said.
That started a series of letters between the county and the authority, as the authority put up some of its own money to keep the house running.
"Based on some of the letters we got, we got an indication that they were willing to work together and move forward," Riggins said.
The county offered about two months of expenses to the authority to keep it open in April and May. Senior Assistant County Attorney Michael McNeill wrote that the authority could continue that kind of arrangement as long as they provided detailed information about where the money was going.
"We did get some receipts from them, but not satisfactory, what we would need for an audit ourselves," Miller explained.
The letter also mentioned reimbursement for the few months where the authority ran the place on its own if it turned in the required audits. Riggins says they did everything they needed to do, but still had no luck.
"We had sent spreadsheets of what we were sending, what we were doing. We were under the impression, if we worked with someone, then we would again be given the past monies," Riggins said.
So, the authority locked up the house at the end of last month and decided to stop managing the house. According to records from Riggins, the county sent another check to keep the center open, but the authority's board decided to give the money back.
Miller says the authority is welcome to keep managing the house, but the county needs the audit. Riggins says they plan to focus on their regular work as a management company for family homes in Pleasant Hill.