City staff reviewed the July financial statements and related accounting work at the Ocean Shores Finance Committee meeting on Aug. 28, flagging several funds that are outside the usual target and outlining next steps including a planned budget amendment in November.

Staff said the City Hall/erosion-control project exceeded budgeted expense because the city received a grant and spent well beyond the $7,700,000 that had been initially budgeted; that will be addressed in a budget amendment. "We've spent way more than that because we got the grant. Once we get through that budget project and we do our budget amendment, that will that will shift to where it's supposed to be," the presenter said.

Staff also pointed to the golf fund (Fund 102) at about 102% of budget and a Mitigation Land Bank (Fund 406) charge of $93,600 that resulted from returning mitigation credits to the FAA after a 1984 Department of Ecology finding. Staff said Marshall Reed, the city planner, is still waiting for confirmation the mitigation credits transferred.

On the budget calendar, staff said, "We are going to do 1 budget amendment this year, and that budget amendment will probably happen in November." The committee was told that the single amendment will be used to clean up several large project accounting items.

Cost‑allocation and operations: Staff described a multistep cost‑allocation project to move vehicle maintenance and fuel charges out of the general fund into appropriate departmental codes. The presenter said the city archived 225 unused expense accounts (450 on the biennial schedule) and created fuel codes to capture department fuel usage, with a large journal entry planned after August financials are closed.

Springbrook/cloud migration and reporting: Staff described the migration of the city’s Springbrook accounting system to a cloud environment, which changed report formats and temporarily disrupted custom "crystal" reports. The presenter said staff have access to a Springbrook backup database and are working to replicate previous report formats for committee use.

Rates and insurance: Staff said water and sewer CPI-based rate increases are below the 3% cap this year (about 2.7%) and that the city’s 2026 WCIA insurance assessment is $429,333, about $62,000 more than last year.

Ending: Staff asked the committee to expect the formal budget amendment and more complete cost‑allocation reporting at upcoming meetings, and committee members offered to help with archival reconciliation.