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Liberty awaits change in fiscal status
LIBERTy
Liberty Township is still waiting for word on whether it is going to be released from state fiscal caution.
Steve Shelton, the township’s fiscal officer, said Wednesday the township won’t know until the state finishes the routine audit of the books for the years 2012 and 2013.
He said the audit is ongoing.
Once the state issues a positive audit report, he said, the township can be released from fiscal caution, which is one step above fiscal watch and two steps above fiscal emergency.
A representative from the state auditor’s office said in March its staff is trying to make sure the township has corrected previous findings for adjustments in the 2008-09 audit and that it hasn’t repeated the mistakes in the present audit period.
State Auditor David Yost placed the township under fiscal caution Oct. 3, saying that the township didn’t correct improper budget fund transfers and had it made those adjustments, the general fund would have had a negative cash balance of $313,110.
Yost accused the township of “robbing police and fire funds to balance its general-fund budget.”
The township trustees used $400,000 in state inheritance taxes to correct the negative balance and to correct the transfers. They paid $20,000 from the general fund to the fire fund and $15,000 from the police fund to the fire fund. That occurred at a meeting Oct. 2, but it was too late to stop the notice of fiscal caution, which the township received that afternoon.