HARRISONBURG, La. — An apparent $4 million in excess revenue doesn’t signify a banner year for the Catahoula Parish Sheriff’s Office.

Instead, it’s just the result of a bookkeeping oversight, Sheriff James Kelly said.

In an independent audit for fiscal year 2014, which was released Monday, the auditor noted the CPSO had a revenue variance of $4,470,767 at the end of the year, a variance of 173.2 percent of the sheriff’s office entire budget.

But Catahoula Parish Sheriff James Kelly said the money in question was not included in the CPSO budget for 2014 because it is not, in fact, the CPSO’s money.

“LaSalle Corrections, which is based out of Ruston, owns the prison here in Catahoula Parish, and they house (state) Department of Corrections (DOC) inmates,” Kelly said.

“The funds that LaSalle Corrections receives comes through the sheriff’s office, and the reason for that is a private entity like LaSalle Corrections can’t go into an endeavor with the DOC. That money comes through the sheriff’s office but is immediately turned over to LaSalle management, so it looks like we get a lot of money, but it is basically a wash — it is made out to us, it looks like it is our money, but it is not.”

Kelly said the sheriff’s office has noted the finding and corrected the issue.

“The general public looks at that and says, ‘Wow, we got all this money,’ but we didn’t,” he said. “In reality, it is not our money, we don’t keep it, use it or get any benefit from it whatsoever.”

The audit also notes the alleged misconduct of former chief financial officer George Tosspon, who allegedly embezzled $22,534 in excess wages by giving himself unauthorized raises.

The alleged misconduct was detected nearly a year ago, and was addressed in a separate audit issued by the state auditor’s office. The new audit recounts the facts around the reported embezzlement and makes recommendations for controls to prevent something similar from happening in the future.

Kelly said the CPSO had already implemented the state auditor’s recommendations and said the office was “good” in that regard.