External auditors deliver clean opinion on Lee's Summit fiscal 2025 ACFR

Brianna Burchter, the city's director of finance, introduced the external audit of the annual comprehensive financial report (ACFR) for the year ended June 30, 2025, and turned the presentation over to the auditors from FORVIS Mazars LLP.

Rachel Dwiggins, managing director for the firm's Kansas City office, and Matt McCall of the audit team presented the results. McCall said the auditors had issued an unmodified opinion—"That's a clean opinion"—and reported no material weaknesses or significant deficiencies in internal control over financial reporting. The auditors also performed a compliance audit over the city's major federal award program and reported no findings on the Coronavirus State and Local Fiscal Recovery Funds.

Finance director Brianna Burchter summarized several key items from the ACFR: the city intentionally spent down reserve balances to invest in one-time community items (including the Green Street market, downtown safety package and vehicle replacement programs) and recognized approximately $2 million in EMS billing write-offs; the ending general fund balance was described in the presentation as approximately $33,000,000 (about 34.6% of expenditures), which staff said remains within recommended reserve ranges.

The auditors noted presentation-level accounting changes in this year's ACFR driven by reporting-entity considerations and new GASB guidance adopted this year (GASB Statements cited in the presentation). The audit team said it assisted management in preparing the ACFR, completed testing on a risk basis, and had no audit adjustments that management recorded.

Next steps: the ACFR is posted online for public review; staff will continue to provide financial information to the committee and follow up as requested.