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Audit Objective

Determine whether the Town Clerk/Tax Collector (Clerk) properly accounted for fees (including campsite rentals), real property taxes and water and sewer rents.

Key Findings

The Clerk did not:

• Remit real property taxes totaling nearly $1.4 million in 2017 and 2018 to the Town Supervisor (Supervisor) or County Treasurer (Treasurer) each week, as required by law. For example, the Clerk collected taxes totaling $951,513 during the first seven weeks of 2017 (from January 2 through February 17) but made only one remittance totaling $909,157 to the Supervisor on February 14, 2017.
• Deposit real property tax collections within the required timeframe. For example, $468,215 or 34 percent of taxes paid by check in 2017 were deposited from eight to 38 days late.
• Always deposit fees within the required timeframe or remit them to the Supervisor in a timely manner.

Key Recommendations

• Remit all real property tax collections to the Supervisor and Treasurer within the required timeframe.
• Deposit all real property tax collections within the required timeframe.
• Deposit all fees intact within the required timeframe. Fees should be accurately remitted to the Supervisor in a timely manner.

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