Villa Park trustees press staff for missing budget detail and question Baker Tilly audit

Trustee Sabri called a special Village of Villa Park board meeting June 29 to demand missing financial detail after she and Trustee Kumar found discrepancies between the five‑year projection presented to the board and the documents trustees could review. Sabri said preliminary comparisons showed a possible $5 million to $13 million gap and asked staff to provide reconciliations and supporting invoices so trustees can understand current spending and long‑term projections.

The request was framed as oversight: “the information was incomplete and unreliable,” Trustee Sabri said, pressing for reconciliations, department‑level expense flows and details on specific line items such as legal fees. Trustee Kumar emphasized the need to match expenses to current, regular revenues (property and sales tax) and to identify which departments’ costs are driving pressure on reserves and pension liabilities.

Director Micah told the board she had only the five‑year projection that was presented at the previous Community‑of‑the‑Whole meeting and had no additional updates to provide at the special meeting. “Any information that goes beyond that, I don’t have an update to provide to you,” she said.

Village Manager Rivas said staff had not been given the lead time necessary to produce the deep, item‑level analyses trustees were requesting for a special meeting. “None of this has been prepared. … This requires a lot of data and analysis and research and so we’re not prepared to present any of this information,” Rivas said, noting staff had been asked to pull spreadsheets and detailed bills but needed time to verify and respond accurately.

Trustees pressed on a forensic review paid to accounting firm Baker Tilly. Trustee Sri and others said the village approved roughly $120,000 for a forensic audit and expected a multi‑year review and forecasting; trustees reported that the consultant’s outputs to date had been limited and that staff and consultants had not resolved flagged discrepancies. Director Micah described uploading four years of checks and bank statements into Baker Tilly’s portal and said the firm returned a spreadsheet labeling some items “duplicates” or lacking vendor names; staff spent days reviewing the file, contested many flags as inaccurate and have not received satisfactory follow‑up. “I was pretty blunt on that email and I said that I was disappointed in that information,” Micah said, adding she had not heard back from the consultant in about six weeks.

The board directed staff to consolidate a specific, written list of the documents and reports trustees want and to deliver that list to the village manager so department heads can prepare the requested data. Trustees asked for: department‑level expense reports, line‑item bill listings related to major categories (legal, overtime, capital repairs), an updated organization chart and quarterly status on the strategic plan that was funded in 2025.

The meeting produced no formal budget action; trustees instead agreed to follow up with a written set of requests to staff and to expect more complete, searchable reports at a later date. Baker Tilly’s outstanding deliverables and the unresolved questions about the scope and completeness of the forensic review remain an open issue for the board.

Next steps: trustees will submit a consolidated, written list of requested documents to the village manager and expect staff and the consultant to respond with verified, item‑level data before any formal budget adjustments are adopted.