Auditor issues clean opinion; county reserves well above policy

CLA auditor Jonathan Sherwood told the board the county received an unmodified (clean) audit opinion for the year and that the auditor's work found no federal or state compliance findings in the federal single audit or state program tests.

Sherwood described two repeat material weaknesses: (1) material audit adjustments that had to be proposed and entered during the audit to produce complete financial statements, and (2) limited segregation of duties in smaller departments where the same person may both collect and reconcile receipts. He said the findings are not a "giant red flag," but are repeat items the county should monitor.

On fiscal health, Sherwood said the county's reserve policy target is a minimum of 35% of expenditures but that the county's reserves were approximately 49.6% at year-end. He recommended options for using excess reserves—prefunding debt service, funding capital projects, or other one-time uses—and flagged planned KIPP allocations and proposed transfers discussed later in the meeting.

Provenance: topicintro SEG 598; topfinish SEG 938.