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Board rejects motion requiring monthly school bank reconciliations and detailed reports
Summary
A motion to add a set of monthly school financial reports (custom expenditure summary, detailed expenditure report and reconciliations for operational, grant, student-activity and cafeteria accounts) failed after members debated oversight vs. micromanagement and the timing of reconciliations.
The Andover Board of Finance debated and rejected a proposal Dec. 17 to make detailed school financial reports a standard part of the board packet.
Member Liz moved that monthly packets include a custom expenditure report, a line-by-line detailed expenditure report (including encumbrances) and bank reconciliations for the school operational, grant, student-activity and cafeteria accounts. "We're responsible to know these things," Liz said, arguing the board needs the information to properly evaluate the board of education's top-line budget requests.
Jody Tenny, the newly introduced AES finance director, told the board she can provide the reports and attend meetings to answer questions. "I'm committed to coming to your meetings to answer questions," Jody said, offering to send the finance summaries the week after the board of education meets.
Other board members expressed concern about information overload and possible micromanagement of school operations. One member said the board of finance does not have line-item authority over board of education spending and worried extensive monthly reports could be burdensome to produce and interpret. After discussion, the motion was put to a roll-call vote; the motion failed.
The board nonetheless agreed to receive the standard summary expenditure report and related materials that the finance office already prepares and to revisit the question if the need for more detailed oversight persists.
Next steps: the finance director will circulate the routine reports to board members and share them with the town packet preparer. The board agreed to keep the matter on future agendas and to reassess after members have reviewed the provided material.
