Councilor’s review of check registers and P‑card activity prompts accounting clarifications

At the meeting’s consent-agenda discussion, Councilor Heisler asked for C4 and C5 to be pulled for detailed review and spent nearly two hours walking through the town’s June and July check registers and purchase-card charges. He questioned payments to consulting firms, subscription services, temporary labor, AutoCAD and Bluebeam software, uniforms, boot allowances, petty cash, and multiple split charges (for example, a single $12 car wash coded across four departmental accounts).

Town staff and department directors answered line-by-line: Matt and Stacy (department staff) explained that some consultant contracts had shifted from percentage-based to flat-fee arrangements; Aspen covers bottled water and vending purchases for town facilities; DLT Solutions charges were for AutoCAD seats split across facilities, streets and parks; “BeenVerified.com” is used by code enforcement to obtain contact information for property owners; and some p-card charges are split among departments for allocation reasons. Staff acknowledged the limited description space on p-card statements and offered to make receipts available to council and the public on request.

Councilor Heisler raised concerns about temporary labor costs, explaining that seasonal help is used to backfill staff during peak months. Public works director (Matt) said the town has used temporary help for years and that managers are working on school‑based staffing solutions for seasonal work. On uniform and boot allowances, staff said the town will propose a clearer uniform‑allowance policy and tighter purchasing controls to avoid ad‑hoc p‑card purchases for higher‑priced items.

The council voted to approve the pulled consent items after staff answered the questions; the motion to approve C4 and C5 passed unanimously. Staff committed to better coding, more detailed receipts on request, and to returning with proposed policy changes on p‑card use, uniform allowances, and cost‑allocation practices.