Issues revealed within Northampton’s FY24 audit
Published 3:13 pm Friday, January 31, 2025
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JACKSON – Northampton County’s revenues and expenditures have continued their upward trend, according to the most recent audit report for the fiscal year covering July 1, 2023 through June 30, 2024 (FY24).
The commissioners received the audit report during their meeting on Monday, Jan. 27. Hunter Wiseman, a representative from the audit firm Thompson, Price, Scott, Adams, and Co, presented an overview of the numbers, as well as the issues the county has to address in their financial bookkeeping.
“We do have a number of audit findings and issues to discuss here,” Wiseman said.
Some of those findings/issues included the following:
County employees should be diligent in receipting collections (including electronic payments) on a daily basis and making bank deposits daily.
Budgets for all funds need to be reviewed for accuracy, and efforts need to be taken to ensure that budgets are properly maintained in the accounting software.
The county should ensure that the movement of expenditures between legally separate funds are recorded as transfers and properly approved by the Board.
The county should ensure that employees are setup in the ORBIT (retirement) system with correct hire dates.
The county should ensure that journal entries that are entered into the county’s accounting system are reviewed and approved by a designated employee that is independent of the entry.
Several funds that appear to be inactive need to be transferred to close them out.
The county needs to ensure that documentation for grant revenue and expenses is maintained and filed so it can be found when needed.
The finance officer was not properly bonded during the fiscal year.
Wiseman did note, however, that this last issue was corrected in June 2024. But it still was included in the report since the finance officer needs to be bonded for the entire fiscal year.
He also noted that the auditors were not aware of any material misstatements in the audit report.
Wisman then gave an overview of the numbers for FY24.
The county’s total Fund Balance in the General Fund was $28,928,670, which is an increase of roughly $428,000 from FY23. This continues the trend of previous years where the Fund Balance has increased.
Of that total Fund Balance amount, $22.7 million is unassigned, or 59.93 percent. That amount is a slight decrease from FY23, which saw an unassigned Fund Balance of $23.3 million. The percentage is still higher than the group weighted average of 51.79 percent.
The General Fund’s total revenues equaled $41,972,267 while expenditures were at $40,656,684. Both of those numbers increased from the previous fiscal year.
As usual, the county’s largest source of revenue came from ad valorem taxes (55.32 percent). The county’s tax collection percentage was 96.91 percent, which is very slight increase from FY23. But that collection percentage is still lower than the group weighted average of 97.98 percent.
Northampton County’s tax rate for FY24 was $0.83 per $100 of valuation.
The county’s largest expenditures were in Public Safety (30.39 percent) and Human Services (30.39 percent).
The county’s debt for FY24 was reported at $16,594,347, a decrease of approximately $1.6 million from the year prior. That continues a decreasing trend for the past few years.
After the presentation, some members of the board expressed concerns about the findings.
“This is concerning to me as a commissioner. And it’s heartbreaking,” said Melvetta Broadnax Taylor afterwards, in regards to the number of findings and issues.
She said her biggest concern was seeing the issue with the ORBIT system.
Wiseman agreed, saying, “it’s extremely important that information be entered correctly and timely.”
Commissioner Keedra Whitaker also expressed her concerns with the audit report.
“We understand the point of an audit is so that you can look at the errors and improve,” she said. “But it’s just so many severe areas in this audit that need urgent attention. There’s some intense training that needs to take place.”
During his comments at the end of the meeting, County Manager Julian Phillips addressed the audit report, saying that they’re already working on corrective actions.
He noted that in the past year, the finance department worked with the auditors on three different audits, including FY24, to get caught up. The county had fallen behind in filing timely audit reports for the past several years, and he said they had been working hard to fix that issue.
“We’ve been working on getting things done, getting them straight, getting them right,” Phillips emphasized. “I’m a man of standards. I believe in doing things right and by the books.”
“Am I pleased with the findings? No. Was I expecting findings? Yes,” he continued, explaining that past mistakes couldn’t be corrected while they were catching up.
Phillips reported that they’ve already communicated with the state’s Local Government Commission, and they’ve identified the corrective actions they’re going to take moving forward.
“I want to take care of business and get it done, get it right. This time next year, you’re not going to see these types of findings. It’s unacceptable,” he concluded.
As previously reported by the News Herald, Northampton County received their FY23 audit report in March 2024, and the FY22 audit in December 2023.