Washington County Commissioners Court on Nov. 25 accepted the county’s 2024 annual comprehensive financial report after an audit that produced an unmodified (clean) opinion.

Elias Tristan of Singleton Clark & Company, the county’s external auditor, told the court the general fund had an ending fund balance of about $16,900,000 as of Dec. 31, 2024 — a decrease of about $517,000 from 2023 — representing roughly eight months of operating expenditures. Tristan said the audit produced an unmodified opinion and that the county’s single-audit of federal relief funds (ARPA and related programs) likewise received an unmodified opinion with no reportable noncompliance.

Tristan said auditors did not identify any material weaknesses but did find significant deficiencies in accounting and financial reporting. He traced those findings in part to the county’s current process of maintaining trial balances on a cash basis and then converting them to modified-accrual for reporting, which required a substantial number of audit adjustments. “Whenever that conversion happens, a lot of errors happened … and because of that, we had to make a high number of audit adjustments to the books to get them ready for external reporting,” Tristan said.

Commissioners and staff discussed plans to transition the county’s books toward modified-accrual accounting to reduce conversion adjustments; Tristan and county staff said work with Tyler Technologies was already underway to implement beginning balances and streamline future reporting. The court then moved, seconded and voted to accept the 2024 audit report.

The acceptance is procedural: the audit documents the county’s fiscal position and identifies areas for improved accounting controls and reporting; commissioners and staff described next steps to convert systems and reduce future audit adjustments. The county said it intends to continue working with auditors and Tyler Technologies to implement the accounting conversion ahead of the next audit.