Toledo’s accounts commissioner became acting finance director Thursday after the resignation of George Sarantou as the department’s leader, the Hicks-Hudson administration announced.

Peter Rancatore was hired by the city in November, 2015, as “administrator services II” in the city finance department and soon thereafter was promoted to commissioner of accounts.

City Councilman Larry Sykes, chairman of council’s finance committee, said he has “complete confidence” in Mr. Rancatore.

“He is a CPA, and I cannot think of a better person,” Mr. Sykes said.

Mr. Rancatore’s new salary is $94,812 a year. His previous salary was $77,500.

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Mr. Sarantou resigned Wednesday from his $94,813-a-year job in the wake of questions about why more than $8 million sat idle in a fund for five years, when the Hicks-Hudson administration knew about that money, whether it was moved properly, and what ultimately happened to it.

He was hired as finance director in January, 2014, by then-Mayor D. Michael Collins, after serving 12 years as a Toledo councilman. Mayor Paula Hicks-Hudson said he voluntarily offered his resignation.

Mr. Sykes would not answer questions about Mr. Rancatore’s role in moving the $8 million that was in the city’s “general obligation debt-service fund” from 2011 through the end of 2015 and into part of 2016.

Mr. Sarantou and Mr. Rancatore initially said the money in that fund was “tax-increment financing district” fund money, which is restricted for certain purposes. Both eventually admitted they were mistaken.

“His boss has stepped down,” Mr. Sykes said. “So you have your pound of flesh. We are not going to wipe out the whole department.”

Mr. Sykes said the money was moved into the debt service fund in 2011 by the administration of then-Mayor Mike Bell.

“Nobody knew what Mike Bell put that money there for,” he said. “We will go through this thoroughly and put a policy in place so it will never happen again.”

The issue became public after a Blade report showed the city’s general obligation debt service fund had $8.2 million beginning in 2011. That money carried over year-to-year. The end-of-year balance on Dec. 31, 2015, was $8.94 million.

In December, 2016, most of that money was removed with an accounting maneuver that is not usually used. That is when the Hicks-Hudson administration transferred less than the amount needed for debt payments into the general obligation debt-service fund — $9.2 million rather than the $19 million as it did in 2015 — which reduced that fund balance from $8.94 million at the end of 2015 to $197,000 at the end of 2016, records show. The amount essentially removed was $8.74 million.

Mr. Rancatore was the city official who confirmed to The Blade last month how the money was quietly moved out of that fund.

The city’s 2016 Comprehensive Annual Financial Report, completed June 31, included “prior period adjustments” that corrected the accounting maneuvers and shifted the $8.74 million into other funds.

Mr. Sarantou and Debt Commissioner Bryan Benner told The Blade last month that the $8 million-plus was actually known about and “accounted for” since 2014. The Blade could find no proof that was true, and city officials did not respond to requests for evidence. A review of the Toledo City Council-approved capital improvement budgets for 2014 and ’15 — the first two years of Mr. Sarantou’s tenure as finance director — showed no sign that money was appropriated for any purpose or listed as revenue.

The mayor sent a letter in late July to Ohio Auditor David Yost requesting an audit after disclosure that the millions sat idle for five years and revelations that city officials had for years illegally commingled funds.

Mr. Rancatore was Lucas County chief deputy auditor before he was hired for his city job by the mayor in November, 2015. He was among the volunteers for the mayor’s election campaign in 2015.

Meanwhile, city spokesman Janet Schroeder said a national search will be conducted for a new finance director.

“This is not a promotion. Mr. Rancatore will serve as acting director for a very brief period likely to be less than a week, and possibly as short as a day or two, and will receive the commensurate salary only for that time period,” Ms. Shroeder said. “He will return to his commissioner’s salary when an interim director is named.”

Contact Ignazio Messina at imessina@theblade.com or 419-724-6171 or on Twitter @IgnazioMessina.

First Published August 4, 2017, 4:00 a.m.