The Town of Bucoda’s budget was not in compliance with its own internal policies or state law between 2020 and 2022, according to the Washington State Auditor’s Office.
During a Bucoda Town Council meeting last month, staff from the Office of the Washington State Auditor were on hand to discuss the results from an accountability audit conducted on the South Thurston County community’s finances.
Auditors looked at budgets, financial reports and receipts from Jan. 1, 2020, to Dec. 31, 2022, and concluded during that time frame the town was not in compliance with state law or Bucoda’s own internal policies.
Additionally, auditors stated adequate controls to safeguard the handling of public resources and funds to prevent misappropriation were lacking in most areas of the town’s finances they examined.
Some of the issues uncovered during the audit included a lack of timely bank reconciliations and other finance controls, such as securing check stock.
According to the report, this resulted in the Town of Bucoda losing $18,276 due to fraudulent checks being written by “unknown people over a period of two months” during the time auditors were checking.
Additionally, support was not provided for 16 of the 44 accounts payable transactions state auditors requested information for, totalling $48,559 during the timespan.
Auditors were unable to verify if those 16 transactions were legitimate.
Another seven accounts payable transactions — totalling $114,955 — also lacked proper documentation, but town staff were able to obtain proper documentation from vendors after asking.
Payroll documentation was lacking as well, as town staff did not retain employee payroll documentation totalling $188,949 during the two years auditors looked at.
On top of that, proper pay rate documentation was not kept, and secondary payroll amount reviews prior to disbursing paychecks to town employees were not conducted.
Some credit card transactions were also examined by the auditors, and of the 14 transactions auditors looked at, 13 of them lacked proper supporting documentation.
As for Bucoda’s overall budget expenditures and revenue during the timespan auditors examined, expenditures were $457,557 in 2020, $814,334 in 2021 and $553,547 in 2022.
The town’s revenue was $437,175 in 2020, $1,001,195 in 2021 and $667,759 in 2022.
At the end of the accountability audit report, the auditors thanked town staff and the council members for their cooperation during the audit process along with the corrective efforts they were making to address the auditor’s concerns.
During the town council meeting last month, some of the fixes were discussed, including changing policies revolving around payroll, receipt and credit card documentation along with additional finance reporting training for town staff.
The Town of Bucoda’s official response in the accountability audit report is as follows:
The Town of Bucoda did lack adequate oversight and internal controls to safeguard public resources, which did increase the risk of misappropriation and prevented the town from ensuring compliance with state laws.
In the last four years we have had three mayors, three clerk/treasurers, and multiple public works employees. The consistent turnover has led to a lack of ensuring compliance with internal policies, procedures and state laws.
The newest clerk/treasurer is going through training right now to ensure proper accounts payable disbursements, payroll expenditures, cash receipting, credit card documentation, procurement practices and annual report filing. As training has progressed, we have identified and confirmed with the state Auditor's Office that we need to utilize our BIAS systems support to do a financial audit to rectify our system to become in compliance.
Going forward the Town of Bucoda will address all findings discovered and will put in place proper financial oversight to be in compliance with state laws.
The Chronicle is working to set up an interview with Bucoda Mayor Callie Carpenter — who just began to serve as mayor this past summer — to discuss in detail what’s being done to address these issues.
To view Bucoda’s full accountability audit report, visit the Office of the Washington State Auditor’s website at https://bit.ly/3yWXYeK.
