Even tough the City of Saskatoon has recovered all of its lost funds from a fraud scheme earlier this year, the matter isn’t quite over yet.

The opposing side has until December 23rd to file an appeal, although City Manager Jeff Jorgenson is optimistic that an appeal won’t be filed.

“They (the opposing side) would need to spend significant money on lawyers to fight for that money back and from what I see, my interpretation of the court’s conclusion is that we can see where they would be coming from to make a claim.” said Jorgenson during the City’s Governance and Priorities committee on Monday.

A report was presented to the committee with many councillors asking city administration if a similar situation won’t happen again. Jorgenson said the City has taken significant steps to prevent a similar incident from happening again.

“The controls that were in place at the time have been substantially fortified and our internal auditor PwC has been working very hard with administration to make sure that we are as well protected as we possibly can be from these types of frauds.”

The City will have to cover $75 thousand dollars for legal fees after an Ontario judge awarded $25 thousand dollars to the City to partially cover legal costs.

If an appeal is filed, the City may have to pay more in legal fees. The City report found that no one employee was at fault for the loss. The report goes on to say the investigation determined that there was no malicious intent by any civic employee and that the fraud was systemic failure primarily related to a lack of appropriate procedures or guidelines for employees.

In August, $1.04 million dollars had been deposited into a fraudster’s bank account before it was realized a suspect or suspects were impersonating the CFO of Allan Construction, a company contracted by the city, and had their banking information changed.