Cochise County finance staff ask supervisors for CPA contract, funds to support ERP rollout

Cochise County finance leaders asked the Board of Supervisors on Wednesday, April 30, for funding to hire a certified public accounting (CPA) firm to prepare required annual reports and to provide consulting support while the county implements a new enterprise resource planning (ERP) system.

Monica Miranda, director of finance for Cochise County, told the board at a work session in the Supervisor Hearing Room that the finance department's 2025 salary budget totaled $1,148,003.80 and its operations-and-maintenance budget totaled $247,004.51. Procurement's 2025 salary budget was $248,239 with an operations-and-maintenance total of $53,025. For FY26, Miranda said finance is requesting an increase of about $50,400 in O&M and a separate contract to cover preparation of the Annual Comprehensive Financial Report (ACFR) and the Annual Expenditure Limitation Report (AELR).

Why it matters: Miranda said the CPA contract would free finance staff to focus on implementation of the county's new ERP and provide "an extra set of eyes" on reconciliations, new Governmental Accounting Standards Board (GASB) implementations and audit deadlines. The county is deploying a Tyler Technologies ERP to replace its current New World and ADP systems; staff said the ERP is intended to integrate payroll, procurement, contracts, revenue and other financial processes to reduce manual entries and errors.

Miranda described finance as a relatively small general-fund department that provides accounting, payroll, grants administration, accounts-payable processing and property/capital-asset management for county departments. She said the department has 13 full-time staff and procurement has three staff, and that grants administration handles SEFA schedules and grant reimbursements for departments.

Board members pressed staff on cost and scope. Miranda identified an $80,000 funding request on the slide deck for the CPA engagement but acknowledged that other estimates she had seen were higher; board discussion referenced prior, higher estimates in the range of about $280,000 to $350,000. Miranda said any firm hired for the work would be procured through a formal bid process.

On the ERP rollout, finance staff said they had roughly 50 confirmed implementation sessions scheduled, some of them multiple days, and emphasized the workload overlap between audit preparation and ERP implementation. Miranda said the contracted CPA would help produce the ACFR/AELR and be available during audit meetings so staff can focus on ERP trainings and system setup. She said the county currently uses a product called Gravity to assemble the ACFR and AELR and that Gravity's GASB-87 and GASB-96 modules assist with lease and subscription reporting; staff said Gravity has been used for about two years and that the county anticipates continuing some reporting support while the ERP is implemented.

Procurement and contracting details discussed included the county practice of awarding fixed-price service contracts and the intention to put the CPA engagement out to bid. Board members asked about fee caps; staff said federal procurements typically limit allowable fees to roughly 15 percent but the county evaluates proposals on price and technical criteria and does not automatically cap contractor profit at a county-wide percentage.

Miranda and Deputy Director Sasha Dwire described how the Tyler ERP aims to connect financial functions now split across New World, ADP and other specialized departmental software. Staff said the ERP should reduce manual reconciliations, provide direct access to invoice attachments from ledger entries and improve transparency for new staff and auditors.

No formal action or vote was taken at the work session on the CPA contract request; the presentation was informational and staff indicated the request would be considered as part of the FY26 budget process and through normal procurement rules.

Additional details: Miranda said the finance department pays subscriptions and membership fees for five staff to the Government Finance Officers Association for training and guidance on GASB changes. Procurement staff identified on the presentation include Annie (contracts administrator), Nicole (buyer) and Cindy (property manager). Staff said one accounts-payable position was vacant at the time of the presentation.

The board convened the work session with all supervisors present; staff noted that public comment is not taken during work sessions. The county scheduled an agenda preview the next day and no vote on this request was recorded during the meeting.