Report of Regents Audits/Budget and Finance Committee to The Board of Regents

The Regents Committee on Audits/Budget and Finance met as scheduled yesterday afternoon, June 17, 2013.  Chancellor Tisch, Regents Brown, Dawson, Chapey, Cea, Cottrell, Norwood, Phillips, Tallon, Tilles, and Young were in attendance.

ITEMS FOR DISCUSSION

March 2013 Fiscal Report

Our Chief Financial Officer briefed the Members. General Fund spending reflects the amounts appropriated in the 2013-14 enacted budget. Accounts are in structural balance with the exception of the Tenured Teacher Hearings (TTH) account. The enacted State budget includes a $6 million appropriation for claims, a $2.2 million increase from the prior year. With these funds, the deficit at the end of 2013-14 is projected to be $6.2 million. Special Revenue accounts are all in structural balance on a current year basis and the accumulated negative balance in the Cultural Education Account is being reduced by approximately $700,000.

Update on Credit Recovery Audit

The Committee was updated on the status of actions taken to address recommendations contained in an April 2013 Office of the State Comptroller (OSC) audit on the use of Credit Recovery by School Districts.

Completed Audits

The Committee was presented with 19 audits this month.  Three of the audits were issued by the Office of Audit Services, 15 by the OSC and one by the New York City Comptroller’s Office.  Fifteen of the audits were of school districts, two were of charter schools, one was a College, and one examined the use of a network within the New York City Department of Education.

The findings were in the areas of claims processing, cash, financial reporting, information technology, capital construction, budgeting, the Tuition Assistance Program, and the use of a network. The Committee was briefed in more detail on the audits of the use of Unique Student Identifiers in school districts and the audit of Lake Grove/Mountain Lake Maintenance and Tuition Payments.