Auditor gives Vestavia Hills City Schools unmodified opinion; board approves March financials

Jason, an auditor with Carr, Riggs & Ingram, told the board the firm would issue an unmodified opinion on the district’s financial statements for the fiscal year ending Sept. 30, 2024, and highlighted key audit procedures and estimates used in the review.

“An unmodified opinion is the opinion that you want,” Jason said, summarizing the audit report and noting the audit included testing of federal expenditures (a single-audit focus on child nutrition this year) and internal-control sampling. He told the board there were no audit findings this year from the sampled work.

Courtney (finance staff) presented the board’s monthly financial statements for the period ending March 31, 2025. She said the district had collected 94.6% of budgeted tax revenues to date (versus 102.5% at the same time last year) and earned $151,415 in interest income in March. General-fund expenditures and transfers were 55.6% of budget as of March 31, she said, compared with 53.7% at the same point last year; Courtney told the board those figures exceed a strict 50% midpoint because of some annual payments made early in the fiscal year.

Following the presentations, the board moved and approved the financial statements for March 2025. Board members also heard that bank reconciliations were complete as of March 31 and that staff expect tax collections to continue to “trickle in” over the next six months and ultimately reach full budgeted levels.

The auditor recommended the board review the “required communications” letter in the audit packet for details about estimates (pension and other postemployment benefits) and internal-control matters; Jason offered to answer follow-up questions and to present more detailed pages of the report if the board requested.

After the audit discussion, the board approved routine consent items and the next steps for the district’s audit engagement with the same firm.