Hank Investigates: Who's Keeping Your Cash

It's a financial windfall they had no idea was waiting for them. For Wendell in New Bedford, we found $142!

Wendell Miranda
"I'm just happy to get it back."

For Brian in Braintree, we found $600!

Hank Phillippi Ryan
"Did you know about this money."

Brian Connolly
"No."

And there may be money for you! We found Wendell and Brian, and thousands of others on these lists. What these people aren't being told: they have hundreds of thousands of dollars just waiting to be claimed. It's all in city and town treasuries like Wilmington.

Hank
"How much money is there in your town?"

M. Ronald Mendes, Wilmington Town Treasurer
"$35,000"

Framingham:

Virginia Cahill, Framingham treasurer
"$170,000"

Lowell:

George Garabedian, Lowell treasurer
"$200,000"

The money is unclaimed property and excise tax refunds, forgotten paychecks and uncashed payments to vendors. To make sure that "abandoned money" gets back to its rightful owners, state law gives communities just two choices. They can turn it over to the state treasurer’s office, which publishes these lists of owners every year, or they can notify people with their own list, put in a local newspaper. The state treasurer's office says there's no other option.

Hank
"They have to do one or the other, correct?"

Neil Harrington, MA State Treasurer's Office
"That's correct."

But our investigation found only Dracut is giving its money to the state.

Hank
"So you'd expect everyone else to publish a list?"

Neil Harrington
"That's correct."

But when we checked more than a hundred other cities and towns. We found nine of ten communities with unclaimed money are just ignoring the law! Local treasurers across the state admit it.

Lowell:

Hank
"So do you've never published a list in the past?"

George Garabedian, Lowell treasurer
"That's correct."

Chelmsford:

Hank
"Do people know that that money is coming to them?"

Charles Mansfield, Chelmsford treasurer
"Uh, they wouldn’t know."

But town treasurers do know who's owed what, it’s right here in these financial ledgers we obtained from dozens of them. These are the names that should be published like this in a local paper every year, but instead, they're buried in some municipal file cabinet.

Hank
"Why don’t you publish a list?"

Michael Joyce, Braintree treasurer
"It costs money to do that. We're in a budget crunch."

So how can these treasurers get away with that? That abandoned money law includes no punishment for towns that don’t obey it!

Hank
"Is there anyone in charge of making sure they do?"

Neil Harrington
"No, it’s really up to them to follow the law."

Treasurers insist, they're not taking your money away.  If you come ask for it, you can have it. One problem:

Hank
"How are people supposed to know they have money waiting for them if there is no list?"

George Garabedian, Lowell treasurer
"Well, that’s what we're working on now."

More problems: Fall River admits it has no list, and no idea who it owes money to. Others places keep track just by check number, not by name. Some admitted they'd have no idea how to look up your record.

Hank
"Do you even have a list of names of people who are owed money?"

Charles Mansfield, Chelmsford treasurer
"No, we don’t."

Hank
"You don’t even have a list of names?"

Charles Mansfield, Chelmsford treasurer
"No."

And in Framingham, we found the record keeping so abysmal, the brand new treasurer just had to take $100,000 in unclaimed checks and erase them from the books.

Virginia Cahill, Framingham treasurer
"Yeah, we just couldn't identify who those people were."

And there’s one thing more, as long as the town holds your money, it’s earning interest on it. You are not.

Hank
"So the more money that's in the account, the more interest that's earned for the town."

M. Ronald Mendes, Wilmington Treasurer
"Correct."

But bottom line: by breaking the law, towns are actually losing! If advertised money stays unclaimed for a year, the towns can use it! But now, all that money just sits in a bank. Communities don't get it, and neither do you.

Brian Connolly
"Everyone is entitled to their money. It’s not fair that the town holds money that doesn't belong to them."

Many town officials we talked to say they're now putting together lists of people with unclaimed checks, and some now plan to publish those lists!

To contact your local town or city treasurer go to this web site and click on 'member list' which is at the top center portion of the page:  http://www.masscta.com/