County Audit findings; 2022 County Election reminder

At the time of last week’s County Committee meeting, County Mayor Jonah Keltner was happy to announce to the commissioners that Lewis County is still ranked among the top in the state for sales tax revenue.

The November sales tax report came out this month and showed Lewis County had an increase of 91 percent in sales tax revenue since November of 2019. In November of 2019, the sales tax was $103,305.77 and in 2021 it had bumped up to $197,498.01.

Mayor Keltner also announced that the County’s General Fund stood at $1,974,704.95 at the time of the meeting which is a significant improvement when compared to last year. The Solid Waste fund stood at $207,059.34. The County General Fund is still owed approximately $376,000 from the USDA for the airport project, and still has $300,000 in State Grant money that has to be used by June 30, 2022 in a one-time purchase, preferably on infrastructure.

2022 Election Reminder

One of the handouts Mayor Keltner had prepared for the commissioners was a paper detailing key dates for the upcoming 2022 election which included qualifying and withdrawal deadlines for those who wished to run as a candidate for commissioner.

This will also be the year that the commission will drop from 18 commissioners to nine, leaving one representative per voting district.

The first day to pick up petitions is Monday, February 7, 2022. The Qualifying Deadline is Thursday, April 7 at 12:00 and the Withdrawal Deadline is April 14 at 12:00 noon.

The voter registration deadline will be Tuesday, July 5, and early voting will begin on Friday, the 15th and will end on Saturday, July 30.

County Audit Findings

The County performed well during their 2021 audit. Only one office was found to have a deficiency, which was the Sheriff’s Office.

One of the deficiencies listed was that the official cash journal was not properly maintained. Although the cash journal contained columns for cash in bank, no transactions were posted. Other columns were not always totaled, and ending balances were not always carried forward. This problem led into the second problem listed which was that the bank statements were not reconciled properly with general ledger accounts during this year. While outstanding checks and deposits in transit were netted against the statement balance, the resulting balance was not reconciled with general ledger accounts.

The Sheriff’s response and plan for corrective action was that “the employee responsible for this is no longer here. It appears she was maintaining the journal and ledger the same way the previous employee was maintaining it. The way it was being maintained; this office understands the finding. This office also understands what is expected in the future. Note: all credits, deposits, checks, etc. were recorded; but again not to the standard expected.”

The third finding was that the office did not prepare and file an annual financial report. The Sheriff’s response and corrective action plan was, “The person that was shown how to do this left this office without showing or explaining to anyone this process and this report was overlooked. A report was turned in, but not the report on the necessary spreadsheet.”

The final finding was, “The sheriff’s department issued a check totaling $7,500 from its drug control operating bank account to a vendor to fund the unbudgeted portion of a patrol car purchase. This practice resulted in the office bypassing the purchasing and budgetary processes of the county and disbursing county funds that had not been appropriated by the county commission as required by statute.”

The Sheriff’s response and corrective action plan was,

“This office was trying to disperse funds from this account that should not have been in said account. This office was offered a fully equipped patrol car valued at approximately $27,500 for $7,500 from the 21st Judicial Drug Task Force, but time was limited. This office purchased the vehicle with a cashier’s check from the bank where said account was. This also got this account down to an amount appropriate for drug operations. Bill of sale, copy of check, NADA report, bank receipt, etc. available upon request to show accountability.”

Correction

In last week’s issue it was stated that Terry Cotham was the previous airport manager at the Paul Bridges Field. The correct previous airport manager was David Sublett.