New York State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli today announced his office completed audits of City of Long Beach, Town of Minisink, Village of Tannersville and Town of Wales.

"In today's fiscal climate, budget transparency and accountability for our local communities is a top priority," said DiNapoli. "By auditing municipal finances and operations, my office continues to provide taxpayers the assurance that their money is being spent appropriately and effectively."

City of Long Beach – Budget Review (Nassau County)

The significant revenue and expenditure projections in the proposed budget are reasonable. The proposed budget includes appropriations for overtime salaries totaling $2.7 million, which may not be sufficient. Annual overtime costs averaged approximately $3 million for the last five completed fiscal years.

Town of Minisink – Board Oversight (Orange County)

Employees did not use leave request forms or timesheets that included hours worked. As a result, employees were paid for hours that did not match the payroll registers, at rates that were not board approved and had deductions that did not match personnel records. In addition, employees received and were paid for leave time to which they were not entitled and received reimbursements that were not authorized.

Village of Tannersville – Water Department Operations (Greene County)

The village does not use water meters and officials cannot determine how more than 90 percent of the water produced is consumed. While the village produced approximately 98 million gallons of water during the 2015-16 billing cycle, it recorded commercial usage of about only seven million gallons. Village officials have no information concerning whether the remaining 91 million gallons was consumed by residential customers, used for municipal purposes or lost to leakage or unapproved use.

Town of Wales – Financial Management (Erie County)

The board adopted budgets based on unreasonable estimates of revenues and expenditures. Appropriated fund balance was not used to finance operations as planned and the town accumulated unrestricted fund balances totaling $1.2 million in the general and highway funds. The board also did not adopt a reserve fund policy or document plans for expected future use for two of its five reserve funds.

For access to state and local government spending, public authority financial data and information on 130,000 state contracts, visit Open Book New York. The easy-to-use website was created to promote transparency in government and provide taxpayers with better access to financial data.