Council accepts audit showing "clean" opinion; public calls for deeper review of utility finances

Palm Coast City Council unanimously approved Resolution 2025 accepting the city's annual comprehensive financial report for the year ended Sept. 30, 2024, after auditors presented the audit and confirmed they issued an unmodified (clean) opinion.

The report and a subsequent council discussion focused on the reliability of the city's financial statements, the city's fund balance, and questions raised in public comment about developer reimbursements and utility finances. "We do have what's called an unmodified opinion or a clean opinion. It's really the best opinion we can provide over a set of financial statements," the auditor told the council during the presentation.

Why this matters: the audit is the independent annual check on the city's finances and internal controls. A clean audit opinion signals that the auditor did not find material misstatements in the financial statements. Still, several residents pressed the council for additional, narrower reviews of specific areas such as utility billing and developer reimbursements, and council members discussed the difference between a routine financial audit, a targeted forensic audit, and a broader state-initiated operational audit.

What the auditors reported

The auditor said there were no findings in the report on internal control and compliance and no comments in the single-audit testing of…