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ST. LOUIS — Celeste Metcalf, who placed third in a three-way race for ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ comptroller earlier this month, is criticizing incumbent Darlene Green for firing her in what she says was an unexpected and arbitrary move in March 2019.

Metcalf, a certified public accountant and former auditor with KPMG, joined Green’s office in January 2019 to lead the city’s internal audit division.

According to Metcalf, it was Green who recruited her for the job. But after Metcalf had a dispute with another employee — now deputy comptroller Jason Fletcher — Green fired her over what Metcalf said seemed to be Metcalf’s flagging of a mistake she had found in an old internal financial report.

Metcalf said her firing raises questions about Green’s management, particularly because Metcalf isn’t the only high-ranking comptroller employee Green has dismissed with little explanation in recent years.

“We need someone who will spend some time gathering all the facts before pulling the trigger,� Metcalf said. “All I was doing was my job and about to do it very well.�

Green, however, said Metcalf was the one who asked her for a job and then struggled to understand her role. Metcalf didn’t get along with other employees, Green said, and demanded a new computer and administrative assistant after she was hired. City employees can be fired without cause during their first six months of work.

Green dismissed Metcalf’s story as a stunt on behalf of Green’s opponent in Tuesday’s election, calling Metcalf “messy.�

“Everything she wanted we got for her,� Green said. “I saw the red flags right off the bat.�

Metcalf denies she asked for a new computer or office assistant — “that’s not my style,� she said. And Metcalf said Green wouldn’t have known if she wasn’t working because she was hardly in the office. Metcalf said she was already speeding up the office’s audit procedures when Green fired her.

Metcalf’s criticism of Green comes a week before ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ voters decide who will serve as comptroller — one of the city’s most powerful positions — for the next four years. Green, a 30-year incumbent, faces a well-financed challenge from Donna Baringer, a former state representative and alderwoman.

After first declining to endorse either of the remaining candidates, Metcalf later said she’d back Baringer despite her initial concerns that Baringer did not possess enough formal accounting experience.

Whether her endorsement now will affect the outcome of the April 8 election is unclear. Baringer edged Green in the first round by just 532 votes. Metcalf won votes from about 24% of the electorate that participated in the March 4 primary, or about 8,500 votes. But the city’s approval voting process allowed her supporters to also vote for Green and Baringer, so it’s unclear how many people identified Metcalf as their first choice.

Before the primary, Metcalf had declined to elaborate on her brief employment in Green’s office or why she left. She said she was concerned it would have come across as sour grapes. But she has since decided it is relevant because of Green’s history of ousting top deputies, including two deputy comptrollers and her former chief of staff.

And, Metcalf said, she wants to explain why an accountant who lives in north ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ and ran as a political outsider would be willing to endorse a longtime politician from southwest ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½.

“I didn’t know Donna before this race, but in the short amount of time I’ve had with her, she listens, she wants to make a difference,� Metcalf said. “Things that she doesn’t know, she’s willing to admit, and she’s willing to look for the person who has the expertise to do whatever it is that needs to be done.�

Asked if Baringer had offered her a job should she win, Metcalf said Baringer has “not promised me anything.�

‘Didn’t make sense’

Green disputes most of Metcalf’s account, including how she got the job in the first place.

Metcalf said Green recruited her, approaching her at an event in early 2018 and then telling her she was working to budget a position for her. After Metcalf left a job at ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ Community College, she said she ran into Green at an event for former Sen. Claire McCaskill and that Green asked her again whether she would come work for her.

Green, though, said it was Metcalf who wanted the job. Metcalf gave Green her card in 2018 at an event at the Missouri History Museum, the comptroller said.

“I believe she asked me,� Green said.

During her first days in the office, as her computer was being set up, Metcalf said she tried to stay busy reviewing some internal financial reports. She noticed a column in one report did not add up and was off by about $6 million. She brought it to Green’s attention, who told her to go talk to Budget Director Paul Payne about it.

But Metcalf moved on. It was an old report and could have been just a typo. She got busy in her new role.

Metcalf said she later “job-shadowed� another auditor to see why it took the office so long to complete some audits. But Metcalf said that angered Fletcher, now Green’s deputy comptroller, who told her she had no business following an employee who reported directly to him. Metcalf, at the time, was Fletcher’s boss.

She said there was no shouting or cursing. But Metcalf did feel it was disrespectful for her subordinate to question how she approached the job.

At one point during the encounter with Fletcher, Metcalf mentioned the $6 million discrepancy and made a quip to Fletcher about how she “just wanted to find $6 million.� But she said the remark was mostly glib.

In an interview, Fletcher said he doesn’t recall any sort of disagreement or confrontation with Metcalf. He actually thought they had a good working relationship.

“I know Ms. Green had her reasons, but I never had any direct issues with Celeste,� Fletcher said.

Fletcher said another manager in the office told him Metcalf was let go because she continued to “fixate on things that were not part of her job, and the budget was one of them.�

Days later, Metcalf said she was summoned to Green’s office.

“I’m thinking I’m going to get a pat on the back,� Metcalf said.

But Green instead brought up the $6 million error.

“‘I thought I told you to reach out to Paul Payne,’� Metcalf said the comptroller said to her. “I’m like, ‘Oh, wow. Excuse me, what?’�

She said she tried to explain what had happened with Fletcher, and how she wasn’t serious about being concerned there was actually $6 million missing.

“Oh, that’s what this is about? Let me explain, so I can explain the whole ‘I just pulled something senseless out of the sky to shut him up,’� Metcalf said. “She said, ‘I don’t want to hear it.’�

Green fired her a few days later.

“If I’m a CPA and if I’m a Washington University MBA that is trained in accounting, that is trained in contracts, that is trained in auditing, why would you let me go?� Metcalf said in an interview. “It didn’t make sense then. It still doesn’t make sense now.�

‘Nothing there’

Green, though, said Metcalf seemed to be too focused on the city budget. She brought “printouts from her own home, telling me, ‘Oh, comptroller, there’s a discrepancy with the budget. It wasn’t balanced, and you need to see this.’�

“There was nothing there,� Green said.

Green also said Metcalf wasn’t doing much work.

“There are certain people who are water cooler types,� Green said. “I think you’ll find her there all the time, always where the work isn’t.�

Both the comptroller and Fletcher said Metcalf wanted a new administrative assistant. But Metcalf had a different recollection, and it was Fletcher asserting his sway in the department he would go on to lead after Metcalf was fired.

“I distinctly remember him saying, ‘We’re about to get a new administrative assistant, and the new administrative assistant is going to be reporting to me,’� Metcalf said.

Green said Metcalf has a checkered work history, pointing to her dismissal as controller of ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ Community College and as a compliance officer in ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ Public Schools.

Metcalf worked for Missouri state government for over six years, overseeing federal stimulus funds after the Great Recession and leading the Missouri Office of Equal Opportunity. Her name was floated as a potential state auditor in 2015 when former Gov. Jay Nixon was looking to appoint a replacement following the death of the former auditor.

After she left state government in 2016, Metcalf went to work as controller for ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ Community College. And after she was fired from the comptroller’s office, she went to work for ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ Public Schools under former superintendent Kelvin Adams.

Metcalf admits she was fired from both jobs, but she says it was because she brought up concerns to management about financial controls. Less than a year after she was fired from ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ Community College, she said, the college accused employee Donald L. Robison of stealing $5.4 million. Metcalf said she didn’t stumble on that specifically, but her questions about the college’s financial practices ruffled feathers as the fraud was close to being discovered.

At SLPS, Metcalf said she confronted leaders about financial controls under former Superintendent Keisha Scarlett. A few months after Metcalf was let go last year, the school board fired Scarlett over her hiring and spending practices. A spokesperson for the district did not respond to a request for comment.

“You will see all the instances where I was fired are instances where I discovered something that someone didn’t want to be discovered,� Metcalf said.

Metcalf said Green is trying to deflect from her own history of firing top employees.

In 2016, Green put her longtime chief of staff, Elaine Spearman, on forced leave for unknown reasons. A few months after she dismissed Metcalf, Green put deputy comptroller Jim Garavaglia, a 30-year employee, on leave. Garavagalia later sued the city and said in court filings he was blindsided by Green’s move to oust him. His lawsuit was dismissed after a judge said he failed to prove discrimination and didn’t give the city a chance to remedy it. Garavaglia is white. Spearman is Black.

In 2023, Green demoted Garavaglia’s replacement, former deputy comptroller LaTaunia Kenner, who then retired without explanation.

Green said Spearman had “done some things that were not according to the conduct of an employee.� And she said Garavaglia had “put the city in jeopardy.�

Metcalf said the city lost out when Green fired her. Even if there was nothing to that $6 million discrepancy, she believes she did her job by spotting it.

“You may be the comptroller, but this is not your fiefdom,� Metcalf said. “If you’re not operating efficiently and effectively, then you’re not doing what’s in the best interest of the citizens of St Louis, and everyone who knows me and knows anything about me knows that that’s what I stand for.�