Santa Clarita / Antelope Valley : State Calls Its Audit of Antelope Valley Fair Finances ‘Misleading’ : Funds: Agency admits error in saying board director spurred investment at bank where he is chairman.

Antelope Valley Fair officials may have been displeased with the findings of a recent state audit that found dozens of violations of state regulations, but fair Director Clyde Golding was personally offended.

Fair directors, according to the audit, agreed to deposit investment funds in the bank for which Golding serves as chairman after Golding made “promises of improved interest rates.”

Golding, however, successfully challenged the audit’s findings. “I have never made that promise. I don’t have that authority.”

At a news conference Thursday, Golding, who has served on the fair board more than two decades, along with fair board President Charla Abbott and fair Manager Bruce Latta, released a letter from the state Department of Food and Agriculture that states “. . . we find our report was misleading. . . .”

“The information presented in the audit was very inaccurate,” said Golding, who said he never did anything to entice fair board members to invest fair funds at Antelope Valley Bank, where he has been chairman since its 1981 inception.

State auditors took Golding’s remarks out of context from the minutes of a meeting, according to the Dec. 9 Agriculture Department letter.

The audit, released in November, made 196 specific recommendations in need of immediate attention at the state-run fair based on a review of a two-year period beginning Jan. 1, 1991. The number of recommendations is nearly four times that made in most reviews of state fairs, according to the agriculture department.

Fair officials must submit a response to the audit by next Friday detailing how recommended changes will be made.

Although auditors admitted they had made a mistake about Golding’s comments as far as interest rates, they said, if nothing else, the appearance of a conflict of interest remains when Antelope Valley Bank does business with the Antelope Valley Fair so long as Golding is a fair director and bank chairman.

“The fair manager must make certain that all banking institutions in the Antelope Valley have an equal opportunity to bid and to provide banking services to the fair,” according to the Agriculture Department letter.

Antelope Valley Fair, according to Latta, still has its main operating account at Antelope Valley Bank but last year closed its investment accounts.