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Hebron officials outline causes and fixes after audit fell six months behind
Summary
Town officials told the Board of Selectmen that staffing turnover and legacy software setup errors caused a six-month audit delay; auditors begin field work Aug. 18 and town aims to issue the audit by September while adopting process, staffing and software corrections.
Lori, the town finance staff member, told the Hebron Board of Selectmen on July 24 that the town's fiscal 2024 audit is six months late because of repeated staff turnover and accounting set-up errors from a 2019 financial-software migration. She said auditors will begin two weeks of field work on Aug. 18 and the town is aiming for an issued audit in September.
The finance staff member said many corrective steps are under way: hours of remediation with the software vendor to fix encumbrances and accounts-payable coding, use of a consultant to reconcile prior-period entries, and development of written year-end-close and departmental procedures. "We're almost there," she said of the encumbrance and year-end fixes.
The town manager, Andy, and board members pressed for ways to prevent future delays. The finance staff member and selectmen discussed revising the job description and pay for the finance position to attract candidates with municipal accounting experience, and they said the town may need to hire a higher-skilled, full-time finance employee rather than a clerical-level hire.
Board members and staff also described software and vendor issues. The town moved to a Tyler/Munis-based product in 2019; some components were not configured correctly at migration, producing a "snowball effect" of correcting entries in subsequent years. Former Phoenix software support ended in 2018, which complicated comparisons to what the town used previously.
The finance staff member said the Office of Policy and Management (OPM) requires a report to MFAC (Municipal Finance Advisory Committee) because the audit is late; that requirement will require monthly reporting to OPM and MFAC until the audit is issued. She said that monthly reporting is acceptable because it will keep the town accountable to complete the work. Selectmen were told the town's fund balance is adequate and that OPM is not currently raising solvency concerns.
Selectmen emphasized the need for documented procedures across departments and for hiring and retention strategies. "If you get someone who is good at governmental accounting, you gotta hold on to them," a selectman said. Lori said she is drafting a formal year-end close procedure with help from professional groups and will deliver additional documentation and recommendations to the board for consideration.
The board did not take a formal vote on staffing changes at the July 24 meeting. Staff said they will return with a proposed job description and potentially revised compensation for the finance role for board consideration.
