The Kansas Bureau of Investigation is digging into allegations against Comanche County personnel, and leaders of this rural community are finding it difficult to answer residents’ questions about the situation.

Residents in this rural south-central county have been reaching out to their officials to ask what happened after former county clerk Casey Huck resigned in March and KBI opened an investigation.

Until that investigation concludes, it’s unclear how the county may have been affected financially by potential wrongdoing, said Joe Moore, Comanche County Commission chairman.

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“It’s a small community. Everybody knows everybody,” Moore said, adding that trust in a small town is important. “There’s going to be long-term effects.”

“We’ve got some ideas because of what we don’t have, but we don’t know the length of it,” he added, referring to financial mismanagement that may have occurred. “One individual who has resigned was elected five years ago.”

Moore said he couldn’t comment about what happened regarding the credit cards or allegations of financial mismanagement and whether those were connected to Huck. He said the county turned over all records to KBI.

Even as they await information from KBI, county commissioners discovered in May that four county credit card bills hadn’t been paid for three months when the issuing bank closed the accounts, commission minutes said.

In a special meeting May 9, county commissioners discussed the four closed credit cards and whether they could get those accounts reopened. The county owed $37,668.85 on the cards, and the commission voted to pay the total amount owed. The cards in question were used by county employees, including for county commissioners, the county clerk’s office and one in Huck’s name.

Commissioners changed some technical processes in May, such as revamping credit card use rules for county employees.

“We changed the limits on our credit cards,” Moore said. “We’re going to check the balance on every credit card every two weeks when we have our meeting.”

Moore said the county also is setting up processes that confirm charges that are made on the credit cards and that records are accurate.

“We’re not sure how deep this thing is yet, either,” he said. “Until we know what actually happened, it’s hard to set changes.”

Moore said he’s concerned about the county’s credit rating, calling potential impacts to it “tough to fix.”

Organizations like Fitch and S&P Global issue credit ratings for government entities. A  lower credit rating can increase interest rates on borrowed money and affect bonds that are issued.

KBI spokesman Dustin Wallace confirmed the investigation is ongoing. Huck did not respond to a request for a comment. In a previous story, she told the Reflector that she “made a mistake.”