Good fiscal year for Moorcroft

Deidre Budahl of Casey Petersen and Associates recently presented Moorcroft's council with the annual audit (July 2021/June 2022) that the town is obligated to complete due to receiving federal funding for the wastewater treatment plant project.

General Fund

This year's audit overview began with Moorcroft's general fund, from which everything but the enterprise accounts (water, sewer, solid waste) are paid and revenues from service fees as well as state and county distributions collected each year.

Budahl reported an increase of receipts for expenses having been and to be paid by the town totaling $522,000. Of that total expense, $350,000 is dedicated for specific purposes as these funds originate with the special purpose tax assessment.

One of the notes of possible concern the company consistently gives to the town is the segregation of duties.

"You have a very small staff and some of that is not avoidable," Budahl understood the problem. "You don't have very many people and it's probably not cost effective to hire somebody, but the important thing is, as a board, to be looking at reports regularly, making sure that the accounting is happening."

Enterprise accounts (water, sewer and solid waste)

Speaking to these three, Budahl noted a cash increase of approximately $132,000, "The activity there is pretty consistent with where it has been. Projects will really sway these from year to year."

Water: the town not preparing a budget for the Powder River Water Project was brought to the council's attention. Budahl admonished, "Wyoming statute requires you to actually put in a budget for every single fund. I think that was an oversight and it wasn't a huge dollar amount, but it's something that should be done."

Wastewater: the council was advised to ensure the closure of the Wastewater Treatment Plant Project budget line as the project is complete along with other line item projects that were ongoing in the last fiscal year, but are now finished.

Landfill: she warned the town to pay attention, saying, "Now that the landfill is not operating fully, your revenues are not going to be there at the level they were." She suggested an examination of site assets like the compactor to perhaps recover a portion of the original investment was discussed.

This, too, is a reoccurring issue; namely, Moorcroft's obligation to cover and monitor the landfill along with the associated cost.

Grants/loans

An inspection of Moorcroft's grant program was not exactly a failure, but while, "I wouldn't say that it was an issue in that nothing was spent inappropriately, there's no money at risk there," Budahl explained the problem is with the "messy" records.

The town is not alone in looking through and working with project files; the state receives the written information as well and annotates and, at times, does not return the documents at all. Budahl noted this concern and advised:

"We had a hard time just trying to figure out who paid what, what was grant or loan...We're comfortable with it, but it's just one of those where, in the future, we recommend maybe have a monthly or quarterly meeting with everybody to make sure everybody's on the same page as far as how those funds have been spent."

She said that of the $2.9 million the town had received in funding during the 2021/2022 fiscal year, the loans amounted to $900,000 and $2 million came to the town as grant funding.

This year's audit, though, ended on a better stand then previous ones.

"Last year, it looked pretty bad," Budahl spoke candidly to the council members, "but it has really improved; this year, you've banked some cash and made some good decisions on how you're spending it."

Anyone who wants to examine the audit in more detail is welcome to drop by town hall and purchase a copy to take home or read one there for free, according to Clerk/Treasurer Cheryl Schneider.