YELLOW SHEET Office of the State Auditor of Missouri Claire McCaskill

September 28, 2001

Report No. 2001-104

IMPORTANT:  The Missouri State Auditor is required by Missouri law to conduct audits only once every four years in counties, like Randolph, which do not have a county auditor.  However, to assist such counties in meeting federal audit requirements, the State Auditor will also perform a financial and compliance audit of various county operating funds every two years.  This voluntary service to Missouri counties can only be provided when state auditing resources are available and does not interfere with the State Auditor’s constitutional responsibility of auditing state government. 

Once every four years, the State Auditor’s statutory audit will cover additional areas of county operations, as well as the elected county officials, as required by Missouri’s Constitution.

This audit of Randolph County included additional areas of county operations, as well as the elected county officials.  The following concerns were noted as part of the audit: 

• As noted in two prior audit reports, the county’s General Revenue Fund is in poor financial condition.  The cash balance has been negative since 1997, declining from ($10,440) at December 31, 1997, to ($144,636) at December 31, 2000.  Increases in receipts have not kept pace with increases in disbursements and the county incurred some large, one-time public safety costs during 2000.  In addition, the county salary commission approved salary increases totaling approximately $98,000 for county elected officials paid from the General Revenue Fund. 

• The county has not sufficiently reduced its property tax revenues.  For 1999 and 2000, the county set the property tax rate without calculating the required rollback. As a result, actual property tax collections were not sufficiently offset by 50 percent of sales taxes collected, resulting in excess collections of approximately $78,011 at December 31, 2000.

• Salaries for elected county officials increased significantly in January 1999.  Our review of the county salary commission minutes and related Prosecuting Attorney legal opinions identified several concerns, including insufficient documentation of salary commission decisions and salaries to be paid, inconsistent application of actions among officials, and the approval of mid-term raises for some officials.  Although the legal opinions indicated that previous salary commission actions did not comply with statutory guidelines and made recommendations regarding salaries which should be paid to various county officials, the salary commission did not reconvene to consider these opinions.  Salaries, however, were paid at the amounts recommended by the Prosecuting Attorney.

• The county does not have adequate procedures in place to track federal financial assistance for preparation of the schedule of expenditures of federal awards.  The county’s schedules for 1999 and 2000 contained numerous errors and omissions.  Without an accurate schedule, federal financial activity may not be audited and reported in accordance with federal audit requirements, which could result in future reductions of federal funds.

• Throughout much of the audit period, the Prosecuting Attorney’s staff did not prepare bank reconciliations, maintain a check register balance, or prepare listings of open items.  In February 2001, the Prosecuting Attorney paid a Certified Public Accountant $1,050 to review the records of the official bank account, determine the check register balance, prepare an open items listing, and reconcile the check register balance to the open items.  

Bad check fees totaling $3,141 collected by the Prosecuting Attorney’s Office in June 2000, appear to be missing.  There is no evidence that these fees were ever transmitted to the County Treasurer for deposit.  Because the Prosecuting Attorney’s office did not reconcile receipt slips issued by the County Treasurer to their receipt records, they were unaware that these monies were not received by the County Treasurer.

• Bond processing fees totaling approximately $10,400 were collected by the Sheriff’s department during the two years ended December 31, 2000, although the state law authorizing the fee had been repealed.

• Because the County Clerk and Sheriff’s department each submitted a claim to the Missouri Sheriff’s Association, the county was improperly reimbursed twice for the same expenses totaling approximately $1,200.

Also included in the audit are recommendations related to budgetary practices, published financial statements, personnel policies, computer controls, and a rental agreement.  The audit also suggested improvements in the accounting controls and procedures of  the Juvenile Office, County Clerk and the County Health Center.  Several of these issues have been mentioned in prior audits.

Complete Audit Report