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Audit Objective

Determine whether Town officials effectively managed the Town’s financial condition.

Key Findings

• Inadequate budgetary practices have resulted in the highway fund balance declining from $58,241 on January 1, 2017 to $5,714 as of December 31, 2019.
• The highway fund’s appropriations were overspent three consecutive years (2017-2019), resulting in operating deficits.
• The Board does not have a policy to maintain a reasonable level of fund balance.
• The Board has not adopted a long-term financial or capital plan.

Key Recommendations

• Include more realistic estimates of revenues and expenditures when developing and adopting the annual budget.
• Discontinue overspending appropriations and appropriating unavailable fund balance to finance operations.
• Develop and adopt a fund balance policy to establish reasonable levels of fund balance, along with a longterm financial and capital plan.

Town officials generally agreed with our recommendations and indicated they planned to initiate corrective action.