Fiscal official briefs Jeanerette
Published 6:00 am Tuesday, April 10, 2018
- Jeanerette fiscal administrator David Greer speaks to Carol Bourgeois of Jeanerette at Monday’s meeting. Greer introduced himself to the Jeanerette community at the meeting and spelled out the areas in which he will be targeting in the months to come.
JEANERETTE — During Monday’s brief regular meeting of the Jeanerette Board of Aldermen, Jeanerette fiscal administrator David Greer gave a brief update about his time so far in the town and the work that needs to be done to better Jeanerette’s finances and audits.
Jeanerette Mayor Aprill Foulcard introduced Greer to the Jeanerette audience that packed City Hall, then gave Greer time to provide an update on the work that has taken place so far and what he sees coming down the road.
Trending
Greer was appointed as a state fiscal administrator for Jeanerette last month by 16th Judicial District Judge Vincent Borne. The appointment came after a unanimous vote from the state fiscal review committee and a lawsuit from the Louisiana Attorney General’s Office.
The CPA, who recently finished years of work as a fiscal administrator in the town of St. Joseph, said that he been on the ground in Jeanerette for about three weeks. During that time, he’s been actively reviewing the town’s finances and staff for about 10 days.
“I’m still learning, still going through all of the processes, procedures, policies, issues, laws, personnel, budgets, all of the above,” Greer said at the meeting.
In the short term, Greer said the town will have to start focusing on amending the budget for the new fiscal year, as well as finish up the three audits that were the cause of a fiscal administrator in the first place.
The 2015 and 2016 audits, Greer said, would have to be audits that are issued with a disclaimer. The board and Foulcard have been in talks with the Louisiana Legislative Auditor to that effect for more than a year.
The disclaimer would be a notice from the auditor that a complete financial record of those fiscal years could not be accounted for, and the auditor only worked with the records that were present.
Trending
Greer said he was meeting with the accountants engaged with working on the 2017 audit, and wants to get that audit completed as soon as possible.
The actual budget, however, is not the worst that Greer has seen.
“I’ve seen worse,” Greer said after the meeting.
“We’ve got a budget. It needs to be adjusted. We’ve got to monitor it and carefully look at it. They have a finance committee that I’ve met with to express some concerns, just things we need to think about.”
The fiscal administrator also said he would start looking at personnel as part of his job, and would be assessing what job functions each employee has and if those employees have the appropriate skill sets.
“I expect each month I will be here to give you an update on where I’ve been, what I’ve done and what I see coming,” he said.
