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Park district may be fined $750

Audit cites district for failing to provide financial papers on time.

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By Tiffany Y. Latta, Staff Writer 10:27 PM Tuesday, January 10, 2012

SPRINGFIELD — The Clark County Park District may be fined $750 for failing to file the organization’s 2009 and 2010 financial statements on time.

“With no financial statements being prepared, they are not available for public inspection,” according to the audit.

Park district financial statements were due in February of 2010 and 2011, but were not provided to the state until Nov. 18, said Brittany L. Elking, a spokeswoman for the state auditor’s office.

The late filing led to a noncompliance citation on a recent audit and could result in the park paying fines of $25 per day, with a maximum penalty of $750, Elking said.

Elking said the auditor is considering waiving the fine since the audit was a first for the organization.

“It seems it was a misunderstanding for them and they are taking the appropriate steps to correct them,” Elking said. “With this being their first audit, we have no reason to think things won’t be OK going forward.”

Clark County Park District commissioners Tim DeVore and Hal Goodrich said they hope the fine is waived.

“We were told it probably would be waived, but we haven’t heard anything official from the state,” Goodrich said.

The audit comes after Clark County voters on Nov. 8 passed a 0.6-mill levy to support daily park operations. The levy will bring in $390,000 for the park district and $1 million for the National Trails and Parks Recreation District. It will cost owners of a $100,000 home $21 per year.

Prior to the levy passing, the park district got by on about $65,000 in local government funds, volunteer help and fundraisers.

Due to lack of funds, staffing was cut from three employees to one and the parks and bike trails closed in November 2010. The parks reopened in April after multiple fundraisers.

The late filing was among several “bookkeeping” errors mentioned in the park district audit.

The organization received a “material weakness” citation — a flaw that has the potential of making the park district’s financial records unreliable — for failing to provide receipts to donors and properly document donations received to support its four parks and bike trails.

“Therefore, no documentation can be audited to determine that all funds were properly deposited and restricted,” according to the audit.

Clark County Park District Director Jim Campbell and park district commissioners said errors discovered by the state were due in part to the organization’s split from National Trails, their unfamiliarity with state audits and not knowing who was responsible for filing their financial statements.

“The park district was not aware that our fiscal agent, Clark County Auditor’s Department, had not filed the required financial statements. The district was under the mistaken assumption that since all record keeping and reporting was handled by Clark County auditors, that they had made the necessary filings,” park district officials wrote in a response to the state audit.

Clark County Auditor John Federer, however, has said his office is not responsible for filing the park district’s financial statements and said he does not know why officials made that assumption.

State officials also recommended the park district make several policy changes to comply with state laws on documenting meetings after the audit found officials did not have records of certain minutes and did not properly document all executive sessions.

The auditor also recommended that the organization adopt policies regulating travel, credit card use and travel reimbursement to prevent abuse, and to only deposit funds with the county auditor.

While the park district deposited the majority of its funds with the county auditor, the organization also put money in three outside bank accounts operated by the park district, the Hertzler House Committee and the First Mad River Light Artillery Division — two committees that operate under the park district commissioners, according to the state audit.

“In order to determine that adequate controls are in place regarding the deposit of public funds and expenditure of public funds, the park district should close all of the outside accounts and deposit all funds with the fiscal agent (auditor).”

Campbell, DeVore and Goodrich said officials are in the process of making changes to park district policies to comply with the state auditor’s recommendations.

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