Auditors give Edmond's financials a clean opinion; Performator score falls to 6.7 as council readies FY27 budget

The Edmond City Council accepted the city's audited financial statements and single audit for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2025, after hearing presentations from HSPG and Crawford & Associates that together described clean audit opinions and a broader financial assessment.

Andy Cromer, CPA with HSPG, told the council the auditors issued an unmodified opinion on the financial statements and reported no findings on four major federal programs in the single audit. "These financial statements are materially correct," Cromer said, and staff and auditors have discussed the reports with the Finance Committee.

Frank Crawford of Crawford & Associates presented his Performator analysis, a composite benchmarking tool that aggregates financial ratios into a single score. Edmond's overall Performator score for FY25 was 6.7, Crawford said, driven lower primarily by a weak unassigned general fund balance (approximately 2.4% or roughly $1.9 million) even as several performance metrics remained strong (an 8.2 on performance measures).

Crawford and council members emphasized that the score reflects audited numbers as of June 30, 2025, and advised cautious use of any near-term revenue increases. "If sales tax starts going up again, we need to be real careful what we do with those dollars," one councilmember said during discussion.

Finance Director Kathy Panas then reviewed the proposed citywide FY26 27 budget package, currently estimated at roughly $485.34 million including utilities and capital projects. Panas outlined the near'term adoption schedule: staff will provide the public notice to the city clerk by May 12, post the full proposed budget for public inspection by May 17, hold a public hearing May 26 and seek adoption on the council's first June meeting (June 8 or 9).

Council directed staff to continue efforts to strengthen reserves and asked for follow'up on staffing phasing, CityLink financial modeling and grant outreach to maximize construction funding where possible.