CLINTON —
The Clinton County Development Association received a “clean” audit this year, but the group will be paying more attention to further internal controls following a suggestion from the organization’s 2011 financial audit.
Jill VanRoekel from Winkel, Parker & Foster, PC, presented the audited 2011 financial statements to the CCDA on Wednesday. She said the audit received a clean, unqualified opinion.
“It is the best opinion you can receive,” she said. “We don’t issue an opinion on internal controls, but do want to bring to the attention.”
The controls are routine procedures used to ensure money is being handled properly.
The CCDA is responsible for more than a million dollars in grants and scholarships from Iowa gaming facilities revenue, which is distributed twice a year through two gaming funds. The Fund A grants and scholarships have already been awarded. The Fund B applications are due July 10.
One section VanRoekel focused on was the need for duties to be segregated.
“You obviously have a small number of people employed in administration functions which makes it hard to ideally segregate duties,” VanRoekel said.
The first means of segregating duties VanRoekel suggested was modifying the bank reconciliation process.
The audit noted that bank reconciliations are prepared on a monthly basis but there’s no formal review process. According to VanRoekel, the CCDA could tighten their controls by having another person with the proper skill set review the documents and sign off on them.
“It’s a good place to see if there’s something going on that you wouldn’t be aware of,” VanRoekel said.
The second means of strengthening internal controls VanRoekel suggested was instituting a system to monitor transfers made monthly from the organization’s money market to the checking account to cover expenses.
“We recommend somebody approve those or sometimes if a transfer is initiated maybe an e-mail be sent to somebody else other than who made it because those transfers can be rather large,” VanRoekel said.
Additional suggestions offered by the audit included having accounts payable checks mailed by a person other than the one who prepares them.
While there is an authorized signer separate from the preparer, a third person could be inserted in the process, VanRoekel said.
Finally, financial journal entries should be more closely monitored.
“With one person having a lot of control over the general ledger they could manipulate that quite a bit,” VanRoekel said.
After VanRoekel delivered the audit, CCDA vice-president Tom Fullerton suggested a committee fix some of the internal control gaps WFP reported.
“Let’s...see how we can close some of these doors. It sounds like other non-profits have found a way to do it using board leadership,” Fullerton said.
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