BOCC approves fair board audit

SANDPOINT — Following a seemingly successful Monday night Bonner County Fair Board meeting, the Bonner County commissioners unanimously voted to approve the auditing process for the board at their Tuesday morning meeting.

Commissioner Asia Williams brought the motion to the table, saying she felt an audit is absolutely necessary to move forward in a harmonious way with the fair board. Williams said if the motion passed, she would figure out which external auditors are available to take on the work, get a contract set up and bring it before the other commissioners.

Multiple public commenters asked for clarification on what the audit would entail — if it would only cover the last fiscal year or if it would also encompass the alleged fraud of fair board funds in 2022.

“Looking at records requests and seeing some of the reports that have been put out there, I’m not 100% sure that money is actually missing from the fair, or had gone missing” said one public commenter. “It’s just not accounted for.”

However, Williams said an investigation into that issue had already been completed and the results had been announced. The commissioner also said that the Attorney General had been contacted to see if they had any concerns about how the investigation was conducted, but the county has yet to hear back.

“In terms of what this audit request is, it is not an audit of what happened with that individual director,” Williams said. “It is the fair board financial money trail that needs to be audited. This is not a ‘gotcha’ moment. This is, ‘We need to identify the internal controls to prevent this from happening again.’”

Williams said she is hopeful that the county can work together to prevent potential fraud now that it seems many of the departments are once again on the same page.

“We’re all saying we have the same goal,” she said. “We want our money in the spaces it belongs in and be able to have a good fair and have good communication with our fair board.”

Bonner County Clerk Mike Rosedale agreed with Williams, saying things seem to be looking up in the county and he’s excited to see county departments working together for a common goal.

“We are more than happy to work with the fair board,” he said. “The treasurer has a statutory role of being the county banker. Right now, there have been bank accounts outside of our treasurer, which we need to reconcile.”

Additionally, Rosedale said the fair board’s invoices, collections, receipts and overall revenue need to run under the county clerk once again. Because of these errors, the clerk said up to this point, auditing the fair board has been impossible. With these corrections, things may run a bit smoother.

“I think it’s going to be blue skies from here on out,” he said.

Commissioner Luke Omodt also asked for clarification on the audit, stating he hoped they were discussing a fiscal year audit and not a 10-year forensic audit. Williams responded that in order to move forward smoothly, the auditors may have to go back farther than one fiscal year to identify problems and fix them for the future.

“Simply looking at 2023 would not capture that data and it would not be beneficial to the county as a whole,” she said. “I’d ask that your consideration be given to what is the recommendation from the professionals and not just the desire of our board.”

However, Omodt said that he would prefer the county start out with a 2023 fiscal year audit that focuses from October 2022 to October 2023. If necessary, he suggested the audit be expanded from that point in the future.

Rosedale, on the contrary, said that the external auditors are the experts in this area and suggested they be allowed to look back as far as they felt necessary to complete a thorough and accurate audit for the county.

“What we don’t want to do is handcuff them or stifle them,” he said. “We want to make sure they get a clean book. We need a starting balance from this year forward, and whatever that entails is what we need from them.”

The commissioners voted unanimously to approve the financial audit of the Bonner County Fair Board. Commissioner Steve Bradshaw he is glad to get everyone on the same page and move forward with the best chance of success for the county.