Auditors give Sleepy Hollow a clean opinion; management letter notes budget variances

Courtney Moore, audit principal at Lauterbach & Amen, presented the village's audited financial statements for the year ended April 30, 2024 and told the board the firm issued an unmodified ("clean") opinion.

Moore walked trustees through key statements and fund-level balances. She said the general fund's year-end balance was about $1.9 million, of which roughly $1.8 million is unassigned; the motor fuel tax (MFT) fund ended with about $28,000 restricted and the Capital Improvements fund ended with about $997,000 assigned. For enterprise operations, Moore reported the water and sewer fund had an ending net position of about $4.3 million, with roughly $3 million shown as net investment in capital assets and about $1.3 million unrestricted.

Moore also described the firm's management letter, noting recent Governmental Accounting Standards Board (GASB) pronouncements that required implementation and one budgetary concern: the MFT fund had approximately $227,000 more expenses than budgeted this year, which the auditors included as a management-letter comment. She said the total audit report spanned roughly 73 pages and recommended trustees begin with the Management's Discussion and Analysis for a high-level overview.

Trustees asked clarifying questions about trustee counts during the audit period and other presentation items; Moore and the audit team answered procedural and data questions. Following discussion, the board moved and approved acceptance of the audit report by roll call.

The village will retain the management letter for follow-up on GASB implementation steps and the budget variance noted for the MFT fund.