Town officials did not effectively manage the Town's cash collection function. Therefore, cash was not adequately or appropriately safeguarded.

We issued a report, dated September 13, 2019, identifying certain conditions and opportunities for Town management's review and consideration. Our audit included recommendations for the following findings: procurement of goods and services and using competition for professional services. We revisited the Town beginning in September 2022 to review progress in implementing our recommendations. Our follow-up review was limited to interviews with Town personnel and inspection of certain documents related to the issues identified in our report. Based on our limited procedures, it appears that the Town has not made progress implementing corrective action as none of the four audit recommendations were implemented.

We issued a report, dated April 5, 2019, identifying certain conditions and opportunities for Town management's review and consideration. Our audit included recommendations for the following findings: budgeting, multiyear financial and capital plans, and contracts and agreements. We revisited the Town beginning in September 2022 to review progress in implementing our recommendations. Our follow-up review was limited to interviews with Town personnel and inspection of certain documents related to the issues identified in our report. Based on our limited procedures, it appears that the Town has made very limited progress implementing corrective action. When we met with the Town Supervisor (Supervisor), he stated that a prior Board member who was on the Board for the first two years of his term informed him that all recommendations related to the audits had been addressed. However, no verification of corrective action was done by the Supervisor. Therefore, of the eight audit recommendations, one recommendation was fully implemented, and seven recommendations were not implemented.

We issued a report, dated March 29, 2019, identifying certain conditions and opportunities for Town management's review and consideration. Our audit included recommendations for the following findings: information technology (IT) policies and procedures, unnecessary user accounts, security awareness training, hardware and software inventories and disaster recovery plan. We revisited the Town beginning in July 2022 to review progress in implementing our recommendations. Our follow-up review was limited to interviews with Town personnel and inspection of certain documents related to the issues identified in our report. Based on our limited procedures, the Town made progress implementing some corrective action. Of the six audit recommendations, two recommendations were fully implemented, one recommendation was partially implemented, and three recommendations were not implemented.

We issued a report, dated September 13, 2019, identifying certain conditions and opportunities for Town management's review and consideration. Our audit included recommendations for the following findings: purchasing processes related to credit card and travel expenditures. We revisited the Town beginning in July 2022 to review progress in implementing our recommendations. Our follow-up review was limited to interviews with Town personnel and inspection of certain documents related to the issues identified in our report. Based on our limited procedures, it appears that the Town has made progress implementing corrective action. Of the five audit recommendations, three recommendations were fully implemented and two recommendation were partially implemented.

We found the Board approved 236 purchases totaling $24,416 (19 percent) that lacked adequate supporting documentation or an explanation to support the purchase as an appropriate expenditure. Town officials and department heads were generally able to provide a reasonable explanation for these purchases. However, without adequate policies and procedures, officials were unable to determine whether all these purchases were appropriate. We also identified 45 purchases totaling $4,305 (4 percent) that were shipped directly to an employee's personal residence. Further, we found 160 credit card purchases totaling $12,938 that were personal purchases made by the former assistant recreation director. In August 2017, the former assistant director signed a letter of resignation and restitution agreement of $14,253, which included interest.

We reviewed 57 purchases subject to competitive bidding requirements (totaling $5.63 million), and found three purchases (totaling $126,477) that were not competitively bid. Further, an additional three purchases reviewed (totaling $708,093) were related to water storage tank improvements and maintenance on two different towers within the Town. We were told that the Town procured these as a professional service because the procurement required a “specialized skill set.” However, Town officials were unable to provide us with any documentation or analysis indicating how they arrived at the determination that the procurements qualified as a professional service exception. We also reviewed payments to 35 vendors whose payments, if aggregated, would have exceeded the competitive bidding dollar thresholds set forth in the General Municipal Law. The Town made payments to three vendors (totaling $295,938) without soliciting bids. Finally, Town officials did not seek competition for eight professional service contracts totaling $384,400.

The Board did not effectively manage and monitor the budgets for the general, water and sewer funds. As a result, total fund balance decreased significantly in the general fund between 2015 and 2017 by $2.89 million (68 percent). However, the decrease was due primarily to a significant one-time expenditure for the Town hall capital project, along with unbudgeted engineering and legal fees. Unrestricted fund balance of $2.7 million at year-end or 55 percent of the 2018 appropriations, remains excessive. Additionally, unrestricted fund balance in the water and sewer funds increased between 2015 and 2017 by approximately $830,000 (87 percent) and $1.9 million (54 percent), respectively, totaling $1.7 million and $3.8 million (92 percent and 136 percent of the 2018 appropriations), respectively. These increases occurred because the Board did not adopt budgets that included realistic estimates for revenues and expenditures and fund balance or establish written policies governing the unexpended surplus funds that the Town should reasonably maintain. Town officials informed us that the amounts in the water and sewer funds were going to be used for significant upgrades to these systems. However, because these funds are unrestricted, this intended purpose is not clear or formally established. Further, the Town has not adopted long-term plans to support maintaining such significant fund balance levels.

The Board did not adopt adequate policies and procedures for monitoring acceptable computer use and granting, revoking, modifying and monitoring individual access rights to the networks. In addition, the Board did not adopt a comprehensive disaster recovery plan or policies and procedures for password security management, data breach notification and backups. Town officials have an acceptable use policy, which is included in the employee handbook. However, employees and officials were generally unaware of the policy's existence and not required to sign a statement to acknowledge that they are aware of this policy. The Board also did not implement a process to address deactivating unnecessary user accounts and did not provide employees with security awareness training to help ensure they understand security measures necessary to protect the network. Town officials did not always maintain a comprehensive Town-wide inventory list of hardware and software. Finally, the Board did not develop a disaster recovery plan to address potential disasters and the continuity of operations, including IT.

The Board established an initial amount of nearly $2.6 million to be used from its capital reserve for a project to construct a new Town Hall. However, it did not prepare an itemized project budget and did not appropriately monitor the project. As a result, the Town incurred total project costs of approximately $4.55 million. The Board did not appropriately approve 14 change orders totaling approximately $265,000. We did not identify, and were not provided with, evidence to support that the Board reviewed or approved these change orders, as appropriate. Finally, when the anticipated project funds were exhausted during the initial construction process, the Board determined it would need to seek additional funding sources to complete the project. Therefore, in 2015, rather than borrowing from outside sources, the Board passed resolutions to utilize approximately $1.1 million of available fund balance and borrow an additional $885,000 (to be paid back over a period of five years with interest) from the Tax Stabilization Reserve to fund the remaining project costs.

The Justice was absent for the majority of our audit period; during this time, the Court operated with three temporarily assigned Justices. We found that important recordkeeping functions were not performed to ensure accountability over the Court's records. Specifically, the Justice and assigned Justices did not review bank statements or reconciliations, and did not review system activity to detect and correct errors. We also found that assigned Justices did not maintain separate bank accounts to track incoming Court moneys, and the Justice and assigned Justices did not personally submit their monthly reports to JCF or ensure that the monthly reports were submitted timely to OSC. In addition, the Board does not ensure that a timely annual audit of the Court's books and records is performed.

We found that seven of the eight municipalities we audited failed to conduct background checks on all of the individuals who deliver their youth program services. Only the Town of Clifton Park annually screened all program personnel against the Division of Criminal Justice Services' Sex Offender Registry and other resources. Two municipalities (Town of Manlius and the City of New Rochelle) only screened personnel providing programs where the State mandates screening, because they believe the application process itself is a deterrent. The remaining five municipalities performed some screening, but did not do it consistently or did not document the date and results of the screening process. Fortunately, our tests of the 1,994 individuals who delivered youth program services in these municipalities did not identify any persons with sex offender or significant criminal histories.