North Carolina health officials are ramping up efforts to recoup about $ 100,000 in debt by a nonprofit run by the wife of former Lt. Governor Mark Robinson.
The state Department of Health and Human Services turned to the collection agency on March 24 to pursue the money, an agency spokesman told WRAL.
It was less than a week after WRAL asked about whether any money was paid, as Robinson returned to the public in a new podcast about his failed 2024 campaign for governor and his struggles with what he described as an obsession with pornography.
State officials have been trying to raise money for more than a year from Balanced Nutrition, a now-shuttered nonprofit run by former Second Lady Yolanda Hill.
Anthony Biller, an attorney for Balanced Nutrition, did not immediately respond to a request for comment when contacted by WRAL on Wednesday.
A state DHHS audit said the nonprofit misreported operating costs to the state. Irregularities in reporting led the state to reimburse nonprofits more than they should have, state officials said.
Research on Balanced Nutrition – which used federal funds to help qualify the day care provides free food to their children – found that the group had sometimes submitted the same receipts several times for reimbursements, had submitted inflated receipts and had broken other rules, including by failing to provide meals that met the minimum standards for nutrition.
Hill and other family members who work for the nonprofit are allowed to take a percentage of the total spending for their salaries. So improperly inflated payments allow them to take more money from taxpayer-funded nonprofits. Hill and other family members received hundreds of thousands of dollars over the years, records show.
The investigation did not lead to criminal charges against anyone involved – only a demand for money to be paid. Officials at DHHS and the North Carolina Department of Justice have turned to collection agencies to try to get the money back. As of last week, according to DHHS, the state has not received the money. The collection agency will have control of the account for six months. If the money is not paid, collection responsibility will revert to DHHS, according to an agency spokeswoman.
Hill shut down Balanced Nutrition after Robinson became the North Carolina Republican Party’s gubernatorial candidate for governor in early 2024. The DHHS investigation first came to light after that.
DHHS initially said the group would have to pay $132,000 but later reduced the amount to about $101,000 after the nonprofit’s legal team presented its side of the case during a meeting with DHHS officials in September.
Hill and Robinson have argued that the accusations were trumped up to damage Robinson’s political career. Robinson is a Republican. DHHS is run by the governor’s office. The investigation began under former Democratic Governor Roy Cooper. It is currently under the administration of Democratic Governor Josh Stein, who defeated Robinson at the ballot box in November 2024.
Stein’s wife, Anna Stein, had worked for DHHS as a part-time employee in the state human resources office. DHHS said in August that he had no role in the Balanced Nutrition investigation or the broader division that handles such investigations.
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