State executive ordered to repay fraudulent reimbursement

PHOTOGRAPHER: The Associated Press

The state inspector general says a state Health Department executive charged the state more than $3,000 for taxi rides she never took.

Following an anonymous complaint, Inspector General Kristine Hamann says she found Luella Kelley was driving to the Amtrak station in Rensselaer then charging the state up to $30 a trip for “taxi fare in lieu of mileage.” The mileage cost was about $9.

The 40-year state employee earns more than $87,000 a year. As part of her job in the Bureau of Employee Relations and Staff Development, Kelley disciplines employees for misconduct. She has been temporarily reassigned and now faces disciplinary action herself.

She told Hamann she’d been making the charges for years, but said she was never told she couldn’t or shouldn’t.