Latest city audit has fewer findings

The City of Tucumcari’s recently released audit for fiscal-year 2022 contained five findings — two fewer than the seven in the FY2021 audit.

The New Mexico State Auditor publicly released the audit, performed by Axiom CPAs and Business Advisors of Albuquerque, on Feb. 9. City manager Paula Chacon said the Tucumcari City Commission will vote to accept the audit this month. She pronounced it a “pretty good” audit.

The city had been on the state auditor’s “at-risk” list after it failed to file its FY2021 audit on time.

Shortly after Chacon was hired as city manager in August, she made it a priority to file that late audit, plus finish the FY2022 audit by its regular Dec. 15 deadline. According to the state, the second audit was received on that date.

A few findings in the last two audits were attributed to short-staffing in the finance department. City manager Paula Chacon said in an interview Wednesday that recently has been rectified.

“We’re at full staff now,” she said. “We have four employees in the department. I’d like to have one more in there. I want a deputy (finance director) that we haven’t filled yet. But the four employees are the most we’ve had since I’ve started.”

Two findings were listed as “significant” deficiencies. One was the lack of IT general controls — a deficiency that has been repeated in the last few years.

The audit states the city needs to develop an IT disaster recovery plan, update its policies, review its user-access list annually, implement a formal password policy and have a third party perform a vulnerability assessment.

Chacon stated in her response the city has contracted with Plateau Telecommunications for IT services and was working with it and the city’s Tyler platform to update or correct issues for FY2023.

The other significant finding was lack of internal controls over EMS accounts receivable. The audit stated the city needs to perform monthly reconciliations to track revenue. It stated total accounts receivable between the city and a third-party billing company did not match.

Chacon noted in her response that the city is under new management, including the fire and EMS department.

“Feel assured that in FY23 this finding will be completed and no longer an issue for the City of Tucumcari,” she wrote in her response.

One less-serious finding was the lack of timely contributions to the retirement healthcare fund. Chacon said short-staffing in the finance department led to that problem.

Another finding was the lack of internal controls over travel and per diem expenses. The audit stated in two of 10 transactions, the city purchased lodging in excess of the state-allowed amount. One of the transactions exceeded the allowed amount by $42.63.

Chacon admitted the city’s mistake, believing the limit was the cost of the room and it didn’t include taxes and fees.

“We went over that while not realizing it,” Chacon said Wednesday. “We’re monitoring that.”

The audit cited the city for late submission of its data collection form to the Federal Audit Clearinghouse. Chacon pledged in her response the FY2023 data will be submitted by the due date of March 31.

Chacon said a few of the findings have repeated, going back to 2018, “that I’m trying to get fixed and get off the books.”

“We’re working to get things back on track. It just takes time,” she added.