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County finance contractor warns of hundreds of thousands in unrecorded disbursements; commissioners debate workflow and oversight
Summary
A county-contracted finance worker told commissioners she faces 3'15 months of unrecorded disbursements totaling hundreds of thousands of dollars and requested authorization to enter reconciliations into the county system. Commissioners disagreed over timing and review; the motion to fast-track data entry was not approved that night.
Linda Smith, a contracted finance/AP worker, told the Osage County commission she is processing a backlog of vendor disbursements that have already left the county's bank accounts but are not posted in the county's financial system.
"This is $469,000 worth of disbursements that we have...the December bank statements are the only thing I'm working on," Linda said, describing color-coded reconciliation work and a larger set of outstanding wires and unpaid entries she estimated as totaling between about $390,000 and, when combined across reports, upward of $800,000. She told commissioners the money "has been out of the bank for three to 15 months" and said she needed clearance to enter reconciliations for specific bank statements so departments could finalize budgets.
Linda asked the board to approve her entering bank-reconciliation reports for specific bank statement dates (Landmark National Bank and Citizens State Bank) so she could move the items into the county's CIC system. She said doing so would let department heads review ledger line items more easily and would improve auditors' ability to match entries to bank records.
Commissioner Heather and other commissioners said they were uncomfortable approving broad data entry without additional review from BT Co. or SJHL, who were acting as project leads and oversight for the reconciliation effort. Heather said she preferred to meet with those oversight staff and to develop a policy for handling older credit-card bills; she requested additional documentation and time to review. A motion to authorize Linda to enter the bank-reconciliation reporting as presented was made but the board opted to move the item to next week for additional review rather than approving immediate data entry that night.
Linda said the work was contractually hers to perform and urged prompt action so departments could complete budgets for May; commissioners emphasized balancing the need to record transactions with the need for oversight and adequate documentation.
No final approval to post the full set of reconciliations was recorded at the meeting; commissioners directed follow-up with project leads and some staff to produce additional documentation before any broad posting.
The meeting record shows a procedural compromise: staff will coordinate with project leads (Miranda/BT Co./SJHL) and return with clarified access, redactions for sensitive account numbers and a proposed policy for handling long-unrecorded charges.
