YELLOW SHEET
Office of the State Auditor of Missouri
Claire McCaskill
|
YELLOW SHEET Office of the State Auditor of Missouri |
September 26, 2002
Report No. 2002-98
IMPORTANT: The Missouri State Auditor is required by Missouri law to conduct audits only once every four years in counties, like Christian, which do not have a county auditor. However, to assist such counties in meeting federal audit requirements, the State Auditor will also provide 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 it 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 Christian County included additional areas of county operations, as well as the elected county officials. The following concerns were noted as part of the audit:
· Reconciliations between the County Clerk's and County Treasurer's financial records are not adequate. The County Treasurer periodically attempts to reconcile the computerized accounting records to the manual fund ledger; however, instead of determining reasons for differences, adjusting entries are made to make the two records agree. In addition, the County Treasurer often posts revenues as a reduction in expenditures, resulting in both revenues and expenditures being understated and inaccurate financial statement presentation.
· Numerous inaccuracies and deficiencies as a result of poor bookkeeping were noted in the information presented in the county’s budget documents for 2001 and 2000. This inaccurate financial information did not provide the County Commission with sufficient information to make informed decisions for the county and did not provide citizens of Christian County with reliable information about the county’s finances.
Procedures are not in place to ensure the county’s budget documents are properly prepared and that they accurately present financial activities of the county. In numerous instances it was not clear where amounts presented in the county’s budgets were obtained, as they did not agree with any records maintained by the County Clerk or the County Treasurer.
· The county entered into a lease agreement with a not-for-profit corporation to issue leasehold revenue bonds totaling $9,875,000 to construct the new judicial center. The county pays the lease payments with the proceeds from a one-quarter cent sales tax passed by voters. The County Commission did not bid the underwriter services or retain documentation regarding other underwriters reviewed and their respective fees. In addition, the county did not solicit proposals for bond counsel services or the bond insurer. These professional services totaled more than $308,000.
· The County Commission does not maintain adequate minutes of its meetings. Unofficial, handwritten minutes are kept by the County Commission's secretary and are used to prepare the typewritten official County Commission minutes. As of June 12, 2002 the last entry in the official record book was for the August 16, 2001 meeting. In addition, several of the unofficial minutes appear to be incomplete and are generally vague.
· The county distributed sales tax and county aid road trust (CART) monies totaling more than $3 million during the two years ended December 31, 2001 to special road districts and cities. Since 1998, the county has accounted for Sales Tax and CART monies in several different ways, but still has not provided a clear picture of all the monies received and how these monies are distributed in the county's budget. While the County Commission has contracts with the political subdivisions which require the monies to be used for the construction and repair of roads, the contracts are not current and do not provide the County Commission with a system of monitoring the political subdivision's use of the county funds. In addition, the County Commission does not require the cities and special road districts to submit sufficiently detailed financial information regarding the actual uses of the funds provided.
· The County Collector’s annual settlements contained errors in amounts reported which caused differences between total collections and distributions. In addition, the main bank account balance is not reconciled to existing liabilities. As a result, the County Collector had approximately $10,900 in unidentified monies in his account at February 28, 2002.
The audit also included some matters related to budgetary practices, published financial statements, reporting of federal funds, county expenditures and procedures, county officials compensation, general fixed assets, and the Senate Bill 40 Board. The audit also included recommendations to improve the accounting controls and procedures for the County Assessor, County Collector, County Clerk, Ex Officio Recorder of Deeds, Sheriff, and the Planning and Zoning Department.