Audit concerns addressed (4/7/04)

REDKEY — Stung by a critical state audit, clerk-treasurer Brenda Adkins says steps are being taken to correct or address all the points that have been raised.

Two Indiana State Board of Accounts audit field examiners studied documents at Redkey Town Hall for approximately a month in order to gather information covering the three-year period from Jan. 1, 2000, to Dec. 31, 2002.

The audit was submitted to town officials in the fall of 2003, but was kept under wraps while town officials worked to try to make the necessary corrections.

It was never discussed at any of the town council’s public meetings.

In some cases, “we didn’t know what to fix until (the auditors) told us,” Adkins said. “We are now making an effort to correct everything they wanted us to correct.”

Some of the concerns raised by the auditors included:

•Deposits not always being made on the next business day.

•Claims submitted for payment without proper documentation.

•Motor Vehicle Highway funds being used to pay for police department expenses in excess of the 15 percent allowed under state law.

“We don’t do that anymore,” Adkins said.

•A promissory note in the amount of $3,000 being paid in 2000 from Motor Vehicle Highway funds to pave the basketball court at the park.

“We thought all paving had to be taken from the street department,” Adkins said.

She said when the paving work for the summer was completed, the paving company sent the town one bill. There wasn’t one bill for street work and another for the basketball court project. Consequently, the entire paving bill was paid with MVH funds, Adkins said.

The auditors later told town officials that the basketball court project should have been paid with park department budget funds. That has since been straightened out, Adkins said.

•Delinquent wastewater fees and water bills owed to the town that were up to 55 months in arrears.

Adkins said the town is now setting up a policy for filing tax liens on properties with delinquent bills as recommended by the audit. However, she added that in some cases the auditors were used to bigger communities with more extensive computer equipment, and “they just didn’t seem to understand our system” regarding water billing accounts.

•The town’s use of Build Indiana money. Redkey received a $5,000 grant from The Portland Foundation as well as a $15,000 Build Indiana grant “to enclose a park shelter for winter storage and to purchase a building to store additional equipment.” These funds were placed in the Redkey Park Non-reverting Operating Fund.

According to the auditors, “The final result was that of the $20,000 received for the project, $15,649 was actually spent on authorized project costs and $4,351 was disbursed for bands and-or fireworks (for a July 4th celebration) which were not authorized by the project.”

Adkins said that following receipt of the audit report, town officials reimbursed the state’s Build Indiana Fund for the $4,351.

•The lack of monthly financial reports for town council members. Adkins said she is now supplying town council members with those reports.

Adkins said she viewed the auditors’ comments as constructive criticism, and the town has already started to follow their advice on several of the points which were raised in the eight pages of “results and comments.”

Also the clerk-treasurer said that the final page of the report — a letter signed by herself and town council president Violet Erlenbush, describing steps which town officials are taking “to improve our problem areas” — was written at the suggestion of Erlenbush to demonstrate the intention of town officials to cooperate with the state auditors.

“We wrote the letter to show that we are doing what they asked us to do,” Adkins said.

“Violet wanted the letter included,” Adkins said.

Adkins said that some of the concerns raised by the auditors dated back to the beginning of 2000, prior to the release of the previous audit. She explained that that is why in some cases, the auditors noted that some of the items cited in the previous audit, covering 1998-99, had not been corrected in the early part of 2000. These things have since been corrected, in some cases as soon as the 1998-99 audit was presented to town officials in 2000, Adkins said.

Even so, there was only a two-page listing of audit results and comments in the 1998-99 document. Adkins described the 2000-2002 audit report as the “most detailed” in the history of the community.

The auditors discussed their report with Adkins and Erlenbush at an exit conference last year, prior to the release of the public audit document. That is reportedly when Erlenbush suggested that she and Adkins write a letter addressing the concerns of the auditors who described that letter as an official response and made it a part of their final audit report.

In the letter, Adkins and Erlenbush said, “The town is taking steps to improve our problem areas. Each item has been addressed, and we are changing and working on these items.”[[In-content Ad]]