Forward with financials

At the August 18 meeting of the Saratoga Town Council, the governing body took action on several items discussed at the workshop held on August 13 including declaring a number of enterprise funds restricted.

As was reported previously (see “Finding a path forward” on page 1 of the August 19 Saratoga Sun), the town council had scheduled a workshop to discuss the findings from the audit of Fiscal Year 2018/2019 issued by Carver Florek and James. In what was one of the most agreeable workshops since the current council took their seats, many of Councilmember Jon Nelson’s concerns over the past year appeared to be addressed.

Councilmember Bob Keel, who served as mayor pro-tem during the workshop in Mayor John Zeiger’s absence and during the council meeting following Zeiger’s resignation, informed those in attendance that there had been some action items discussed at the workshop, which would be addressed by the governing body.

Reports to Council

“One of the first recommendations we had in this workshop was that at, a first council meeting of each month, the town clerk accumulate items that Mr. Nelson and Mrs. (D’Ron) Campbell found that consistently were being left out of the approved bills,” said Keel. “Those were more particularly in the terms of payroll and, in order to catch that, we’ve asked that the town clerk prepare any payroll items from the previous month be approved at the first town council meeting of the month.”

Nelson replied that he felt it was more appropriate, especially relating to the finding in regards to segregation of duties. Instead of Saratoga Town Clerk Suzie Cox presenting the report, it should be Saratoga Town Treasurer Sammy Flohr.

Other items presented to the council in reports should include any prior expenditure in which the expected amount changed. This would allow the governing body to ratify the amount. Additionally, it was discussed that any transfers should be presented to the council. Councilmember D’Ron Campbell clarified that she believed any transfers should be included within the approval of the bills and the minutes.

“Transfer from one bank to another?” Keel asked.

“Enterprise funds, investment funds, unrestricted funds, restricted funds. It all needs to be recorded for the approval of the bills,” replied Campbell. “That’s one of the big things that we found, that all of those WYOSTAR transfers, and everything that were in the bank statements, were not being reported in any minutes or agendas for a year, at least. At least the year we looked at.” 

Keel, providing direction to Cox and Flohr, stated that any time there would be a withdrawal from an account or a transfer from one account to another, it would need to be “brought up at the town council meeting” and could only be performed after approval.

“When you say ‘brought up’, I’d like to have it be in a report of some sort so that the amount and the total are presented,” said Nelson.

Flohr asked the council if they would like a copy of the transfer included in their packet before the transfer is made. When Campbell replied that she believed the council would need to approve that, Flohr replied that the governing body would get a copy of the transfer paperwork before WYOSTAR. When Cox asked if this included the transfers into reserves for the impact funds, both Nelson and Campbell stated that it would.

Further discussion saw the council agree that any activity, aside from the initial deposit into the Town of Saratoga’s general checking account, would need to be approved by the governing body prior to the transaction.

“When we need to move that from one thing to another, it needs to be documented,” said Keel.

“They are documented, I just have to show them to you,” replied Flohr.

Separate Accounts

“I do think, when it’s appropriate, we should discuss the separate accounts because that would show a clear trail of any kind of transfers,” sad Councilmember Judy Welton.

At that moment, Nelson brought up a recommendation he said he had intended to make further down the agenda in regards to the One Percent Specific Purpose Sales and Use Tax (6th penny tax). The recommendation from Nelson was that funds generated by the 6th penny tax and disbursed to the Town of Saratoga have it’s own account.

“We did that for the impact money and I don’t think the Specific Purpose Tax should be any different,” Nelson said. “For example, we got a disbursement within the last two or three weeks of $231,295 and, as far as I can tell, it’s still sitting in the general checking account. I think that needs to be segregated.”

Nelson then made a motion that a WYOSTAR investment account be opened for 6th penny tax disbursements, which passed unanimously. Following the motion, he asked if the current disbursement could be transferred into the newly created account.

“I can open the account, but it’ll be a lot quicker than two weeks from now,” Nelson said. “So, if I transfer that money I would have to wait until I ask you guys if I can do it, right?”

“Yep. It would be on the treasurer’s report for the next meeting,” replied Nelson.

Excess Revenues, Retroactive Allocations

Arguably among the most contentious topics in recent town council meetings, enterprise funds were heavily discussed and accounted for the most action taken by the council in regards to the Town of Saratoga’s finances. 

Keel informed the rest of the council that he would be contacting third-party accountant James Childress for a final reconciliation of the Town’s general fund and enterprise funds. In response, Nelson asked if those balances and statements would be with or without retroactive interfund overhead allocations.

“I have talked with him that we do not support, as a town council, any retroactive interfund allocations. I think we’re pretty unified as a council that any interfund allocations that we want to do need to be discussed with those specific areas,” said Keel. “I think we need to work with them, create good dialogue, create the open communication, so that if an interfund allocation is needed they have a say in it.”

“I would make the motion that we reverse the retroactive overhead allocations that were described in James Childress’ report that he presented to the council on June 23,” Nelson said.

That motion passed unanimously.

Also, in relation to retroactive interfund overhead allocations, Nelson asked Keel how the council would address the changes made to a number of the enterprise funds between March and April. Keel replied that he would contact Childress to provide an explanation as to those changes and whether or not they were, in fact, retroactive overhead allocations.

Later in the discussion, Nelson asked how the council would address the excess of revenues over expenditures for the respective funds. In response, Keel asked Flohr to provide a report and recommendation, with the help of Childress, of the amounts left in the enterprise funds for Fiscal Year 2019/2020 that would need to be transferred by the next meeting.

Enterprise Funds Restricted

The last time there was a motion to declare the enterprise funds restricted, it failed by a 1-3 vote (see “Questioning changes” on page 1 of the April 29 Saratoga Sun). That motion had come during an April 21 meeting that had also seen changes to the balances in the enterprise funds. After the August 13 workshop, however, the council seemed to be on board with making such a declaration.

During the August 18 meeting, Nelson made the motion to declare the following enterprise funds as restricted:

• 911 Assessment Fund

• Hobo Pool Investment Fund

• Airport Fund

• Bridge Street Reconstruction Fund

• ARRA Meter Project Fund

• Specific Purpose Tax Fund

• Water Fund

• Sewer Fund

• Ambulance Fund

• Weed and Pest Control Fund

That motion passed unanimously.

Under discussion prior to the vote, Keel stated that declaring the enterprise funds restricted did not rule out the Saratoga Town Council working with respective boards, commissions and department heads in regards to interfund overhead allocations going forward. When asked by Nelson how Keel expected such discussions to go with entities such as the Saratoga-Carbon County Impact Joint Powers Board, Keel stated that he believed the council would have to work together with those entities on coming to an amount.

“I’m just happy to hear that it’s your recommendation that we restrict the funds, so I won’t argue over semantics. I’m very happy to finally have that before the council, though,” said Nelson.

The next meeting of the Saratoga Town Council will be at 7 p.m. on September 1 at Saratoga Town Hall.