The Dexter Disinformation Playbook: Why a $35k Audit Wasn’t a "Bookkeeping Error"
A city requested help. Auditors followed the records. Partisans rewrote the story.
The political attack on State Auditor Rob Sand over the Dexter Public Library investigation collapses under one sentence from the official report.
According to the Iowa Auditor of State’s special investigation, Dexter was not targeted. Dexter asked for help.
“The special investigation was requested by City officials as a result of concerns regarding certain financial transactions processed by the former Library Director, Mary McColloch.”
That is the fact missing from the partisan version of the story.
The “blindsided” claim also falls apart under McColloch’s own words. In her KCCI interview, she acknowledged that the auditor’s office tried to reach her before the report was released:
“He did try to call me a couple times…”
She then explained why she did not engage:
“I really didn’t know if I would have any information that could help them, and I really didn’t want to get pulled back into it. I had moved on.”
Being blindsided is one thing. Knowing investigators were calling, choosing not to engage, and later claiming surprise is something else entirely.
Before anyone argues about the politics of Rob Sand, start with the record: Dexter asked for the audit, the Auditor followed the money, and the report documented serious financial irregularities.
Independent oversight only works when the public can see the paper trail. Share this with someone who thinks “no charges filed” means “nothing happened.”
What the Auditor Actually Found
This article does not accuse anyone of theft. That decision belongs to prosecutors, not journalists and not auditors.
But the Auditor’s job is not to prove criminal intent beyond a reasonable doubt. The Auditor’s job is to trace public money, identify unsupported or improper transactions, and report what the records show.
In Dexter, the report identified:
$13,589.50 in undeposited collections
$4,179.59 in improper disbursements
$2,404.57 in unsupported disbursements
That is not “nothing.” That is a public ledger that did not add up.
The undeposited collections included checks issued to the library that were deposited into the Dexter Community Foundation account, checks issued to the library that were not properly deposited into the city’s bank account, library donations and fundraiser collections that were not properly deposited into the city’s bank account, and Bayer Ag grant proceeds issued to the library but deposited into the Foundation account.
Dexter called the Auditor. The Auditor found irregularities. The county attorney declined charges. Those facts do not contradict each other.
That does not prove criminal theft. But it absolutely justifies the city asking questions.
And once the city asked those questions, the Auditor had every reason to follow the money.
The Foundation Account They Leave Out
The most important part of the official report is not the political drama. It is the separate Dexter Community Foundation account.
The report says McColloch created the Foundation as a nonprofit organization years earlier. City officials told auditors the City Council did not approve the establishment of the Foundation or its separate bank account. The report also says the Foundation’s articles of incorporation contained no specific language tying it to the Dexter Public Library.
Yet library-related money was deposited there.
Auditors reviewed Foundation bank records and found 167 disbursements totaling $38,722.29. Of those, 59 disbursements totaling $18,247.85 went to McColloch’s husband. Another 31 disbursements totaling $11,197.24 went to Audubon State Bank, where auditors determined McColloch held personal bank accounts. City officials told auditors the city had no accounts at that bank.
That means 90 disbursements totaling $29,445.09 — 76 percent of the Foundation disbursements reviewed — went either to McColloch’s husband or to a bank where she held personal accounts.
The Auditor did not roll that $29,445.09 into the official total of questioned city funds because the Foundation was not a city bank account. That is not overreach. That is restraint.
But it is also exactly why the investigation mattered.
When public donations, grants, library funds, foundation accounts, family reimbursements, and city oversight all blur together, the public deserves a clear accounting.
That accounting does not end just because a prosecutor declines to file charges.
“No Charges” Is Not the Same as “No Problem”
The political attack leans heavily on the fact that Dallas County Attorney Matt Schultz chose not to file criminal charges.
That is relevant. It should be reported.
But it is not the same thing as saying the audit was wrong.
A prosecutor has to decide whether criminal charges can be proven beyond a reasonable doubt. That is a very high legal standard, especially when records are incomplete, accounts are tangled, and intent is difficult to prove.
An auditor is doing something different. An auditor asks: Were public funds properly deposited? Were payments properly approved? Were reimbursements supported by receipts? Were internal controls working?
In Dexter, the Auditor answered: not consistently.
That is the part the partisan narrative tries to flatten. It wants readers to believe that if no one was charged, then nothing was found.
That is not how oversight works.
A fire inspector can find smoke even if the county attorney never charges anyone with arson.
McColloch Wasn’t Targeted. The Records Were.
The official report also undercuts the idea that the investigation came out of nowhere.
After McColloch resigned, the report says library officials were contacted by a concerned citizen who reported seeing her loading filing cabinets and boxes from the library into her personal vehicle. A library official contacted the mayor, the Dallas County Sheriff’s Office became involved, and city and library officials began reviewing records.
During that review, officials identified receipts and revenue listed as collected by the library that could not be traced to the city’s bank account. They also raised concerns about the handling of the Clell F. Hoy Trust.
So on August 19, 2022, city officials contacted the Office of Auditor of State.
That is the story.
Not “Rob Sand targeted Dexter.”
Dexter called the Auditor.
That fact matters because once Dexter asked for a special investigation, the question was no longer whether the Auditor had a right to look. The question was how much work it would take to reconstruct years of transactions after the ordinary paper trail had broken down.
The $35,000 bill did not create the scandal. It revealed the cost of untangling it.
The $35,000 Bill Was the Cost of Untangling the Mess
The politicized version of this story tries to make the audit bill the scandal.
But forensic work costs money because disorder costs money.
If records are missing, if deposits have to be reconstructed, if a separate nonprofit account has to be subpoenaed and reviewed, if years of transactions have to be traced after the fact, that is not a quick bookkeeping check. That is financial archaeology.
The question is not whether $35,000 is a lot of money for a small town. Of course it is.
The question is why the city had to spend that money to reconstruct what should have been clean, traceable public records in the first place.
Blaming the Auditor for the cost of untangling the mess is like blaming the mechanic for the price of diagnosing an engine someone else drove without oil.
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The Bigger Attack on Oversight
Dexter is a small town. But the fight over this investigation is not small.
It fits into a broader political campaign to weaken Iowa’s elected Auditor and discredit independent oversight whenever it becomes inconvenient. That campaign depends on turning every audit into a personality fight and every finding into a partisan grievance.
But public money does not become less public because the records are messy. Public oversight does not become a witch hunt because the findings are uncomfortable. And a prosecutor’s decision not to charge does not erase the Auditor’s documented findings.
The Dexter investigation should not be treated as proof that Iowa’s Auditor has too much power.
It is proof that local governments need strong controls, clean records, and an independent office capable of stepping in when something does not add up.
The real lesson from Dexter is simple:
When a city asks for help tracing public money, the Auditor should answer.
That is not a scandal. That is oversight.
Public money does not become less public because the records are messy. Share this with someone who still thinks “no charges” means “nothing happened.”
The disputed claims addressed in this article were advanced by Iowa Field Report and later amplified by Republican officials. This article tests those claims against the State Auditor’s report, KCCI’s interview, and public records.
Source Notes
Iowa Office of Auditor of State, Report on Special Investigation of the Dexter Public Library, June 20, 2024.
KCCI / YouTube, Iowa woman seeks to clear name 2 years after audit of Dexter library, May 12, 2026.
Luke Martz, State Auditor’s Office led by Sand bungles Dexter investigation while taxpayers foot $35,000 bill, Iowa Field Report, May 13, 2026.
Iowa Field Report, IFR publisher expelled from Iowa Press Association, Jan. 2, 2023.
Iowa Starting Line, Rob Sand says GOP bill to let state agencies bypass auditor’s office could lead to corruption, Feb. 14, 2024.
Raccoon Valley Radio, Iowa State Auditor Rob Sand opens investigation for former Dexter library director, June 24, 2025.