District officials have consistently over-estimated expenditures and appropriated unexpended surplus funds that they did not use. The District's unexpended surplus funds have exceeded the statutory 4 percent limit during the 2011-12 and 2012-13 fiscal years and tax levies may have been higher than necessary. Additionally, the District had four established reserves that totaled approximately $969,000 at June 30, 2013 and had no formal plan on funding or using these reserves. The District's retirement reserves balance of $310,000 was five times what the District spent during the 2013 fiscal year. We also found that the District has a well-designed set of control procedures that can provide reasonable assurance that thefts of cash receipts will be prevented or detected. We reviewed the District's procedures for the collection of cash receipts for milk sales and non-resident tuition, totaling $169,576, and found no exceptions.

In 2008, the Town Board approved a five-year capital plan to construct a new Town Hall/highway garage at an estimated cost of $602,620. Construction began in the spring of 2010. Between 2009 and 2013, the Board expanded the scope of this project and increased the budget from the original estimate of $602,620 to $3,000,000. As of May 2013, project expenditures totaled over $2.2 million, with the remaining work, scheduled for completion in December 2013, expected to incur additional costs. Because Town officials did not develop a comprehensive plan at the onset of the project, detailing how the construction would be completed with available Town resources, they did not determine the extent to which they would need to use contract services and did not properly plan and budget for them. Further, Town officials did not monitor expenditures against estimated costs. The Town also did not budget for over $400,000 in architectural and engineering services and may have incurred unnecessary costs by not complying with certain bidding requirements and not soliciting competitive proposals for architectural services.

The Board did not effectively oversee and monitor the Village's financial operations. The Board did not ensure that it received complete and accurate reports from the Clerk-Treasurer. In fact, we found several material errors in the maintenance of the accounting records and related reports. As such, the Board did not have accurate information with which to base its financial decisions and, ultimately, did not adopt reasonable budgets for the general, water and sewer funds. Inaccurate budgeting and lack of monitoring have caused fund balance to decline in the general and sewer funds. While the Village's funds currently have positive unexpended surplus fund balances, if the Board continues to accept inaccurate financial reports, base its decisions on unreliable information, and not monitor results of operations, the Village could enter into fiscal stress. In addition, the Board cannot be sure that only authorized disbursements (including payroll) were made, that all moneys received were properly deposited, or that all transactions were properly recorded and reported. The Clerk-Treasurer and her Deputy perform most aspects of the cash receipt and disbursement functions without independent oversight. There were 58 disbursements totaling more than $217,000 made and payroll benefits provided without Board approval.

The School billed the correct school districts of residence and, overall, the School maintained adequate supporting documentation regarding students’ residency. However, we found nine students’ files did not contain the required proof of residency; three instances where no date was on the address verification document or the date was several years old; and one instance where the address did not agree with the address on the billing record. Although the results of our testing did not disclose significant errors or irregularities, the errors we did find occurred because the School has not fully developed its residence verification process.

The Board routinely relied on unexpended surplus funds to finance town-wide general and certain water and sewer district operations, and continually adopted budgets that did not provide sufficient revenues to fund expenditures. As a result, unexpended surplus funds declined in the town-wide general fund, two water district funds and one sewer district fund. Town officials stated they appropriated unexpended surplus funds to keep the tax levy and user rates stable. However, this practice resulted in budgets that were not structurally balanced because they relied on unexpended surplus funds to finance recurring expenditures. Additionally, the cost of operations is not sustainable based on the current levels of unexpended surplus funds maintained. As a result, Town officials may need to increase taxes and user fees if unexpended surplus funds are not available to finance operations in subsequent years.

For the three year period ending June 30, 2013, District officials have consistently over-estimated expenditures by a total of $12.2 million and increased the tax levy by 5.4 percent. These budgeting practices generated approximately $2.4 million in operating surpluses, which caused unexpended surplus funds to exceed statutory limits in each of the past three years. For example, at June 30, 2013, unexpended surplus funds exceeded statutory limits by approximately $3.2 million. Although District officials appropriated approximately $3 million in each of the last three fiscal years to reduce the tax levy, the Board over-estimated expenditures by between $3 million and $4 million annually, thus negating any benefit the appropriation of fund balance would have in reducing fund balance or the property tax levy. District officials also used some of the annual operating surpluses to fund nine reserves that, as of June 30, 2013, totaled $4.6 million. Six of the nine reserves are over-funded.

District officials consistently over-estimated expenditures over the past four years by more than $3.8 million, resulting in operating surpluses totaling $1.3 million. Therefore, the majority of the $2.4 million in Board-appropriated unexpended surplus funds was not needed to fund District operations. Because the amount of unexpended surplus funds that can be legally retained is limited, each year since 2009 District officials transferred money in excess of this limit to various District reserve funds. As a result, reserves totaled more than $2.1 million at June 30, 2013. District officials could not demonstrate a planned need for more than $1.7 million of the reserves. Officials also did not appropriately use the debt reserve fund, which had a balance of more than $380,000 as of June 30, 2013. Instead, District officials levied real property taxes and paid debt service with general fund appropriations. By routinely following these practices, District officials have withheld significant funds from productive use, levied unnecessarily high taxes and compromised the transparency of District finances to taxpayers.

The Board did not adopt a policy or method to determine the amount of unexpended surplus funds to maintain. In addition, the bookkeeper/budget officer did not establish procedures to reasonably estimate the amount of fund balance that will be available at year end. As a result, the Board has relied heavily on appropriated fund balance as a financing source in the annual budgets and, in some years, it appropriated more fund balance than was actually available. For example, when adopting the 2012 and 2013 budgets, the Board appropriated more general fund balance than was actually available resulting in budget deficits going into both the 2012 and 2013 fiscal years. Similarly, when adopting the 2012 budget, the Board appropriated more highway fund balance than was actually available resulting in a budget deficit going into the 2012 fiscal year. This has led to a significant reduction in the Town's fund balances from the beginning of 2010 to the end of 2012. Fund balance in the general fund declined 79 percent (from $38,912 to $8,331), and the highway fund balance declined 89 percent (from $38,139 to $4,236) during this period.

The Council and Treasurer have not ensured adequate internal controls are in place over cash receipts and disbursements handled by the Treasurer's Office. The Treasurer did not perform adequate bank reconciliations and did not record all financial transactions accurately, completely, timely and in a clear and transparent manner. In addition, there is not adequate segregation of duties within the Treasurer's Office. Finally, the City is losing 54 percent of the water it distributes, which is substantially higher than the EPA goal of 10 percent. In 2011, the City reported that 719 million gallons of water was treated and 331 million gallons was delivered or used, leaving 388 million gallons of unaccounted-for water. The cost of unaccounted-for water for 2011 is about $265,000.

The Board's oversight of the District's purchasing process could be improved because we found one payment, totaling $9,999, made as the final payment for a $29,997 equipment installment purchase contract, which was not competitively bid, as required. Although the Board Chairman informed us it was bid, we were not provided any documentation to support this. In addition, the Board did not provide adequate oversight over investing District money, budget monitoring and financial recording and reporting. The Board has not adopted an investment policy, as required by statute. The Secretary-Treasurer submits a budget-to-actual financial report to the Board at the start of the budget process, but not throughout the fiscal year. The Secretary-Treasurer reconciles the bank accounts on a monthly basis. However, when we performed bank reconciliations for December 31, 2012 and May 31, 2013 and found that, for both months, the book balance of one account was $1,000 higher than the corresponding bank balance, the discrepancy could not be explained.

Over the past three years, Town officials have demonstrated fiscally responsible management and identified various ways to increase revenue and reduce expenditures. As a result, Town taxpayers have benefited from a declining tax levy for the past three years and an anticipated reduction in the 2014 tax levy. However, the Town's unexpended surplus fund balance has become excessive, and its budgets from fiscal years 2010 through 2012 were unrealistic. Revenues were under-estimated and expenditures over-estimated for all three fiscal years. The unrealistic budgets caused total fund balance to increase significantly from about $2.3 million in 2010 to almost $3.3 million at the end of 2012. Unexpended surplus funds in the general fund at the 2012 fiscal year end equaled 175 percent of the 2013 adopted budget. The Board has not developed a formal long-term plan addressing the excessive unexpended surplus fund balance. The Town's controls over its IT system also need to be improved. The Board has not adopted a breach notification policy, a disaster recovery plan or a policy that addresses the protection of personal, private and sensitive information. In addition, the Board has allowed employees to have more access rights than necessary to perform their job duties.

Based on the results of our review, except for certain matters, we found that the significant revenue and expenditure projections in the proposed budget are reasonable. The County should consider taking steps to address the $31.3 million deficit that remains from 2012 and include provisions for such steps in the 2014 budget. The County has overestimated revenues for the residential energy tax by $5.3 million and for the premium on obligations by $1.3 million. The $5 million being issued in serial bonds for tax certiorari purposes is greater than the estimated $2 million appropriation by $3 million. Therefore, this amount should be transferred to a debt service fund and be restricted to pay debt service on the $5 million bonds and not used for other operating expenditures. In addition, the County has not made an allowance for uncollectible taxes in the 2014 proposed budget. County officials feel that the $500,000 contingency appropriation in the proposed budget will cover any uncollected taxes. However, the average annual amount allocated to uncollected taxes from fiscal years 2009 through 2012 was $2.4 million. Finally, the County's proposed budget exceeds the tax levy limit. The proposed budget includes a tax levy of $105.5 million which is 9.9 percent higher than the 2013 levy and exceeds the allowable tax levy limit increase of 1.66 percent.

Board members have not provided adequate fiscal oversight to the District, which may be caused by their lack of training. Board members did not complete their required training in legal, fiduciary, financial, procurement and ethical responsibilities. The Board also has not established written policies and procedures to govern financial operations, such as investments, cash receipts and disbursements, credit cards, claims processing, capital planning and information technology. The Treasurer did not generate monthly and quarterly reports and the Board did not require that the Treasurer provide them, which severely limited the Board's ability to manage the District's financial affairs. Finally, the District has no internal controls over credit cards.

Although the Board and District management believed they were effectively managing the District's financial condition, budgeting decisions over the last several years have made the District susceptible to fiscal stress. Even though District officials had knowingly generated surpluses in the past to prepare for economic difficulties, they have come to rely on using surplus funds to finance operations, and are close to depleting those funds. Additionally, District officials did not update the District's long-term financial plan to address how they will fund the budgets without the continued use of fund balance.

The Board has not established adequate financial policies and procedures. While the Board has adopted a code of ethics, it has not adopted purchasing and investment policies, as required by statute. The Board also has not ensured that written procedures concerning financial recording and reporting were developed. While we found that the Treasurer does submit monthly financial reports to the Board, the informal bank reconciliations prepared by the Treasurer were not a part of those reports. Moreover, the Treasurer performs all duties with no Board oversight. Also, the Board does not conduct an annual audit of the Treasurer's records nor do they contract with an independent auditor to perform such an audit.

District controls are not adequate to ensure that financial activity is properly recorded and reported, and that District moneys are safeguarded. While the Board has adopted a code of ethics, it has not adopted investment or procurement policies. Additionally, although the Treasurer prepares monthly reports to account for the District's financial activities and files an annual update document with the State Comptroller's Office each year, the Treasurer does not present the Board with budget-to-actual reports for expenditures on a monthly basis. The Board authorizes each claim for payment and indicates its approval by affixing each member's signature on the warrant and on each attached invoice; however, the Board has no process in place to verify it is approving all claims for payment because the Board is not reviewing monthly bank statements or bank reconciliations. Furthermore, although the Board contracted with an independent accountant to perform an audit of the Treasurer's records for the 2010 fiscal year, the 2011 and 2012 records had not been reviewed as of July 31, 2013.

The District does not have adequate financial policies and procedures. The Board has not adopted purchasing, investment, or code of ethics policies, as required by statute.

We reviewed budget-to-actual results for the fiscal years 2010 through 2012 and found that the Council adopted realistic budgets. The Chamberlain monitored the budget with actual results, and City officials made budget transfers as needed throughout the year. In addition, City officials have prepared multiyear financial plans. However, the Council has adopted budgets that have routinely relied on the appropriation of fund balance as a financing source, causing the City to incur planned operating deficits in the general fund. This has led to a significant reduction in the City's unexpended surplus funds from 2010 to 2012. During that period, the unexpended surplus funds remaining at year end declined 84 percent − from $841,747 in 2010 to $136,068 at the end of 2012 − leaving the City with little cushion for managing unforeseen events. Because the City has drawn down its unexpended surplus funds to a dangerously low level, it no longer has fund balance available as a financing source in its 2014 budget.

The Board has not established policies and procedures related to personal, private and sensitive information (PPSI) and sanitizing computer equipment onsite before disposal. In addition, the Board has not instituted policies and procedures to protect data resources. Town officials do not maintain a complete and accurate computer inventory and have not developed an information technology (IT) disaster recovery plan. Because of these weaknesses, IT assets are at risk for unauthorized, inappropriate and wasteful use. Additionally, in the event of an IT disaster or breach, there is no formal plan of what action Town officials should take to restore service or notify those whose personal information has been compromised.

The Board has not taken appropriate actions to maintain the general fund's sound financial condition. From 2008 through 2011, the general fund's results of operations aggregated to net operating deficits of $8.9 million, mainly due to over-estimation of certain revenues in adopted budgets. Although the general fund reported an operating surplus of almost $1.5 million in 2011, this surplus resulted from $4.5 million of questionable inter-fund revenues. Had the Town not recognized this revenue, the general fund would have reported an operating deficit of $3 million for 2011. From 2008 through 2011, the general fund's unexpended surplus fund balance decreased from a surplus of $6.1 million to a deficit of $10.5 million. This decline resulted from adopting budgets that were not structurally sound and using temporary loans to purchase investment properties held for resale. These temporary loans required $26.5 million of fund balance to be reclassified from unexpended/unassigned to restricted and non-spendable. In the event those properties are sold, most of the fund balance will remain as non-spendable until the general obligation bonds issued to finance the purchase of the properties are liquidated. Between 2008 and 2011, the residential garbage district fund made 17 cash advances to the general fund, totaling almost $28 million, to purchase property. None of the 17 cash advances were authorized by the Board, the advances were not paid by the end of each fiscal year, and no interest was paid on these temporary loans as required by law. We question also whether the $5.7 million allocated to the residential garbage district and commercial garbage district funds during fiscal years 2010 and 2011 are legitimate charges attributable to those funds. The Town also paid $203,848 in health insurance premiums for nine officials and employees and $30,751 to four other employees and officials who opted out of the health insurance plan during the audit period, even though none of these individuals were eligible, or otherwise authorized by the Board, to receive such benefits. Finally, the Board has not adopted a comprehensive computer-use policy, a breach notification policy, or a formal disaster recovery plan. In addition, users of the financial software have access rights to sections of the software that are not necessary for their job duties.