Independence financial audit comes back clean

The city of Independence’s annual financial audit has come back clean.

John Chamberlin, an accountant from Chamberlin Owen, the firm that performed the audit, presented the audit’s results to the Independence City Council on Monday. His audit findings came back with an “unmodified” opinion of the city’s financials, meaning they didn’t find any problems.

“We believe that your financial statements are fairly presented within all material respects, and that’s the highest opinion we can give,” Chamberlin said. “That’s what you want from us.”

Cities must perform independent financial audits every year. While not foolproof, audits are a way of ensuring public institutions have good financial procedures in place and are accurately reporting on their monetary figures.

Auditors can suggest policy changes, flag questionable transactions, point out record-keeping deficiencies and indicate shoddy processes within the institution they’re investigating. An unmodified opinion from an auditor means no changes were suggested and is generally viewed as indicating the city is in good shape financially.

Audits do not pass judgment on whether the things on which the city is spending its money are worthwhile.

Highlights from Chamberlin Owen’s audit include the following:

• Overall revenues and expenditures for the city have declined, however, revenue continues to outpace expenditures by a wide margin
• City assets improved by about $2.1 million from the last fiscal year
• The city has about $21 million in cash and reserves, which is enough to keep the city running for about 21 months
• The largest source of expenditures for the city is public safety
• The largest source of tax revenue for the city is payroll tax

You can view a presentation of the audit’s findings below.