SEATTLE — The King County Regional Homelessness Authority’s governing board approved a hiring freeze on Friday and ordered a finance committee review after an audit revealed millions of dollars in unaccounted taxpayer funds.

The vote came late Friday afternoon amid growing calls to disband the agency.

RELATED: City, county councilmembers move to dissolve KCRHA after audit flags $13M unaccounted for

KCRHA CEO Kelly Kinnison told the board there are “no missing funds,” despite the audit indicating about $13 million could not be accounted for. The report also found the agency lacked a chief financial officer, had missing receipts, and allowed purchasing card use with little oversight.

Mike Nurse, a certified fraud examiner with Clark Nuber, detailed the independent audit during a presentation that lasted more than an hour. He said the agency’s structure as a “pass-through entity” for the city and county, combined with weak internal controls, contributed to financial issues, including a negative cash balance and funds that may not be recoverable.

The governing board is co-chaired by King County Executive Girmay Zahilay and Seattle Mayor Katie Wilson. Wilson attended the meeting remotely and briefly addressed the board, reiterating earlier comments that all options remain on the table.

Wilson declined to comment when approached by a reporter earlier Friday.

Zahilay led much of the discussion, and the board unanimously approved the finance committee review. Wilson’s office, represented by Deputy Mayor Brian Surratt, supported the measure, including the addition of a hiring freeze.

PREVIOUS COVERAGE: $13M missing: Seattle leaders call attention to ‘egregious’ regional homelessness audit

Just 24 hours earlier, Seattle City Councilmember Maritza Rivera and King County Councilmember Rod Dembowski announced they were sponsoring a joint resolution to eliminate the KCRHA and unwind the agency over the course of the next year.

Zahilay did not go that far when asked about the possibility on Friday.

“This is not a light switch that can be turned on and off,” he said. “We have to think through all of the ramifications. There are contracts, there is federal funding at risk, there are people’s jobs, and most importantly, we don’t want to disrupt services.”

Seattle City Councilmember Alexis Mercedes Rinck, who previously worked as a director at KCRHA, now serves on the governing board. Speaking after the meeting, she said she left the agency three years ago in part because of concerns about its operations.

“I left three years ago primarily because of the dysfunction I was witnessing within the agency,” Mercedes Rinck said.

She said her focus now is on understanding the full scope of the situation.

“My focus in this moment is ensuring that we really sort out what the truth is in this matter,” she said.

Asked whether it is time to dissolve KCRHA, she urged caution.

“It’s important that we don’t take any knee-jerk reactions when we’re talking about immediate changes,” she said.

Capital One has settled a lawsuit that claimed the company deceived customers by creating two savings accounts with very similar names, but with different interest rates, making owners of the lower-paying accounts eligible for cash payments as part of a $425 million settlement.

Months after the court rejected an initial settlement agreement in the case in 2025, a U.S. District Court judge issued final approval of a new settlement on Monday, April 20, USA TODAY reported.

Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel joined a bipartisan coalition of 17 other attorneys general in 2025 who said the original proposal cheated customers, who lost more than $2 billion in unpaid interest.

Capital One denied the claims in the lawsuit and any allegations of wrongdoing. Both sides ultimately agreed to a settlement to avoid going to trial, USA TODAY reported.

Payments are expected to be sent around July 21, according to the settlement website.

What to know:

What is the Capital One settlement about?

The class action lawsuit against Capital One relates to two types of savings accounts the company has offered: 360 Savings and 360 Performance Savings.

The plaintiffs alleged that the two types of savings accounts are identical, except for the interest rate Capital One paid on them.

According to the filings, Capital One offered the 360 Savings accounts from 2013 to 2019, which is when it began offering 360 Performance Savings.

Though the company stopped offering 360 Savings accounts to customers, Capital One continued to service the existing accounts under the program, the filings said.

The lawsuit alleged that since 2019, Capital One has paid a higher interest rate on 360 Performance Savings than it paid on 360 Savings, despite the two accounts being otherwise identical.

Capital One marketed its 360 Savings accounts as “high interest” accounts with “one of the nation’s best savings rates” that would earn its customers more than an average savings account, Nessel said in a 2025 release. However, while interest rates rose nationwide beginning in 2022, Capital One kept the interest rates for its 360 Savings accounts artificially low. Instead, Capital One created “360 Performance Savings,” a nearly identical type of savings account that provided much higher interest rates than 360 Savings.

In September 2019, the initial New York lawsuit said, “the 360 Performance Savings interest rate was 1.90%, while the 360 Savings rate was 1.0%. This disparity grew even wider over time. Capital One lowered the 360 Savings rate to 0.30% in December 2020, and kept it frozen there during a period of rising interest rates nationwide. At one point, the 360 Performance Savings rate was 4.35%, more than 14 times higher than the 360 Savings rate.”

As a result, the plaintiffs alleged that Capital One deceptively marketed the 360 Savings account and concealed interest rate disparities. The company denied the claims.

Who’s eligible for payment in the Capital One settlement?

The settlement class, or the group eligible for payment, includes anyone who maintained a Capital One 360 Savings account at any point between Sept. 18, 2019, and June 16, 2025.

How much money can you get from Capital One settlement?

Each member of the settlement class will receive an individualized payment.

The total will first be calculated based on the amount of interest the account holder would have earned if the account were receiving the same interest rate as a 360 Performance Savings account.

The remaining settlement fund after deducting those costs and expenses will then be split among recipients based on their individual amounts, according to the settlement website.

Do you have to file a claim in the Capital One settlement?

No, you don’t need to file a claim to receive a payment in the Capital One settlement. All eligible members will receive their payment automatically.

Payments are expected to be sent around July 21, according to the settlement website.

As the price of regular gas soars to $6 a gallon across California, Latino families are feeling the financial burden more than other households in the state, researchers at UCLA said Thursday.

According to a study by the UCLA Latino Policy & Politics Institute, the spiking gas prices are disproportionately affecting the financial health of Latino households largely because they tend to have fewer financial resources and depend on cars for their livelihoods.

Based on a number of data sources, including the 2023 Consumer Expenditure Survey and 2017 National Household Travel Survey, the researchers calculated the average amount of Latino families’ year budget compared to non-Latino households. They also measured households’ dependency on vehicles and the distance.

When Latino households spend more on gas, it’ll eat up more of their budgets, even when they don’t have other means to make up for the difference.

“Latino households spend $1,300 more per year on gasoline than non-Latino households,” the study said. “These higher housing costs leave Latino households with less room in their budget to absorb rising gasoline costs.”

The reason for higher gas expenditure is Latino families tend to commute more than other ethnic groups. They are also less likely to work from home, the researchers said.

“Even before the gas prices increased Latinos households were already spending more money on gas than non-Latinos and always experiencing higher costs of house burden,” Rosario Majano with the UCLA Latino Policy & Politics Institute told NBCLA.

Also because Latino households are less likely to have newer, more fuel-efficient cars, they are spending more on fuel without alternative options, the study found.

Abel Martinez, who is juggling multiple jobs while scaling back on going out, said he understands why Latinos are spending more on gas.

“If you think about it many electric cars are on the pricier side,” Majano said. “Many Latinos are on the lower income so many don’t have the opportunity to buy things like that. “

Researchers said they hope the data can be a tool for policy makers to find ways to support all communities, especially Latinos who are struggling financially but contribute to the state.

As of Thursday, the average price of a gallon of regular gas in Los Angeles County rose was $5.95 per gallon, $5.08 in Orange County.