Former Casper WCDA Director Ordered to Pay $8K in Restitution

A former Casper Wyoming Community Development Authority head on Wednesday was ordered to pay more than $8,000 in restitution after abusing federal funding.

Gayle Scarborough was ordered to serve a 1- to 3-year probation sentence. Should she successfully complete probation, her charges will be deferred.

Scarborough will pay $8,347 to the US Department of Housing and Urban Development. Her attorney, Craig Silva, said Scarborough already has the money to pay the restitution.

State and federal agents began investigating Scarborough in 2016. 

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The investigation began in early December 2015 after a whistleblower contacted a special agent with the U.S. Department of Urban Development inspector general's office, alleging that federal money administered by Scarborough at WCDA was "being used to further fraud in the state."

One of the programs Scarborough supervised was the Wyoming Rehabilitation and Acquisition Program. Federally funded under the Housing and Economic Recovery Act of 2008, the program involves WCDA purchasing foreclosed or abandoned single-family houses and rehabilitating those properties for sale to income-eligible buyers.

Court documents state Scarborough "traveled extensively" from Casper, where she worked, to Cheyenne for WCDA projects. She stayed weekends at Cheyenne hotels, with government dollars covering her accommodations at rates higher than the approved state or federal lodging amounts.

On separate trips to Miami, Florida or Atlanta, Georgia for training, Scarborough would arrive several days early to visit friends and family, billing the lodging and meal costs to the government for her entire trip.

"It was determined that the lodging overage rates caused by Scarborough in 2014 and 2015 which was billed to the [federal programs] cost over $8,347.00," court documents state.

The Natrona County District Attorney's Office filed the charges in June after the Wyoming Division of Criminal Investigation worked on the case for more than a year.