Комиссия округа Гранд единогласно приняла отчет о проверке и рассмотрела заявку на грант для туризма

Vote tallies taken from meeting transcript. Meeting at a Glance is a Moab Sun News summary of public meetings based on official agendas and corrected transcripts. Watch the full meeting above or read the official agenda. See something that needs correcting? Email [email protected]. [Jason Taylor] I'm sure. I [Melodie McCandless] would like to call this joint workshop with the county commission and and the MTAB board to order at 10:34 [Melodie McCandless] on Thursday, August 27, And we will start this meeting, and we have in the next attendance. We have our finance director, Chantel Lindsay, [Melodie McCandless] Commissioner McCurdy, Commissioner Martinez, Commissioner McGann, Commissioner Winfield. We have our chair, Wendell, and myself, Commissioner McCandless. [Melodie McCandless] And the intent for the meeting today is to review the outdoor recreation mitigation grant application with our tourism advisory board. [Melodie McCandless] Wanna take it away? [Wendell Williams] No. Well, I'm we have only just been presented with the application, this morning, [Wendell Williams] and so going through it very quickly. One of the in town letter dated, October the sixteenth last year, [Wendell Williams] our recommendations to the commission, our priorities the number one priority was the scheduling. [Wendell Williams] And so this isn't fitting with our priorities. So making sure that the patient is the priority for the county. And so while [Wendell Williams] with HB 456 and the change in HB 456, this new grant allows us additional mitigation and the services funds. And so with that, I think you guys have been working very diligently on this application, and this is not what's gonna be. [Brian Martinez] Chair, do you mind if I give a small background? Sure. I do wanna note that we have councilman [Melodie McCandless] Taylor that just joined us. He is also an MTAB member. [Brian Martinez] Perfect. Yeah. Thanks. So the the grant that we're talking about came about by from HB 456, there was an additional quarter percent of tax that we passed here as accounting. [Brian Martinez] And so part of that quarter percent of tax went into this outdoor mitigation grant, which is supposed to help out, [Brian Martinez] mitigating impacts of tourism or helping with essential services is kind of the way that I've always looked at it. You know, we started, [Brian Martinez] in the MTAB board. We had a presentation on this. We brought department heads in. We talked to folks about making sure that, they were collecting the data that was gonna be required for this, ahead of time. Both the sheriff's office, [Brian Martinez] solid waste, and EMS as well were all present at that meeting. We had follow-up meetings, individually with each department head, and we also, had a big, meeting here with all the department heads letting them know, [Brian Martinez] of this grant kinda coming up. The the high level of this grant right here is that there's going to be a [Brian Martinez] a reimbursement for search and rescue primarily, EMS, and then and then any road repairs [Brian Martinez] that were required as a safety cost. The priorities in the grant list those emergency costs first, and then there's a second bucket left over. It's about a $6,600,000 [Brian Martinez] fund from what I've been told right now. And so if there is anything left over in the state, it will go into a second bucket, which will be a visitor related safety cost, [Brian Martinez] which would cover your highway, nonemergency, solid waste, and law enforcement. So that's kind of the the breakdowns of those two buckets. [Brian Martinez] The priority ranking on that will be communities that are smaller in size and then communities that have larger [Brian Martinez] that have larger essential service impacts. Right? And then the third criteria on that is that are unable to meet that financial burden [Brian Martinez] that's right there. So, you know, as we go through this, we have a couple of, numbers from this grant that I'll just highlight. So right now, our SAR [Brian Martinez] costs that were identified were 242,367. The EMS, costs that were identified were $695,000. [Brian Martinez] The highway road repairs that were identified as safety cost. And so an example of that is, you know, there's there's road repair that we do, and then there's road repair that needs to be done because there could be, [Brian Martinez] safety, concerns by having to go around that. Good example would be like the Onion Creek. Right? Having to go out there and do that emergency repair on Onion Creek. Right? Because you had people that were trapped behind their equipment and things like that. So it's a little bit more geared towards visitor safety than just standard load repair. [Brian Martinez] And that came in at about $250,000. So that's bucket one. That's so that sits at about one point one point two ish million dollars when you add that up. And then bucket two would be $750,000 [Brian Martinez] that's listed for highway repairs, 8,500,000 that's listed for solid waste, and then 1,600,000 [Brian Martinez] that's listed for law enforcement services. And that's a a a conservative estimate right there on our law enforcement. So that would be considered in there for bucket two right there. [Brian Martinez] One of the things I'd just like to consider or maybe look at putting in this grant, so I think that we all understand that number one, right, we qualify as being a small community. Right? 10,000 people. So we are one of the smaller communities that will be eligible for this grant. [Brian Martinez] Number two is I think that everybody could see the cost or the size of our essential services to this community. But I think that the easiest way to to really see the financial [Brian Martinez] strain that the county is under with this really is to look to see how we used our TRCCA this year to fund essential services. [Brian Martinez] You know, in the previous years, we have used our TRCCA for for other services throughout the county. So it's it's it it is worth noting this year that we did use our our TRCCA [Brian Martinez] for that. So it shows that the that those are a growing cost, and it's it will be nice to see some of those funds be able to come back and reimburse those costs moving forward. [Wendell Williams] And I've recommended that in our letter of last year to be able to use TRCCA towards mitigation. Yep. Correct. [Brian Martinez] Well and, anyways, I hope that that helps providing in that note even tonight. [Wendell Williams] So we're gonna go through or, I mean, the application. So can you can I [Melodie McCandless] over the all the numbers? Yeah. [Wendell Williams] I just I mean, the one Mhmm. It's out, obviously, a solid waste of eight point if and that sounds what kind of funds are available [Wendell Williams] if it's they're asking 8.5. $6,000,000 [Melodie McCandless] available. But I think that the this does is it gives the state a really good idea of what does it cost to communities [Stephen Stocks] to have tourism. Right. And so even though we won't be getting $8,500,000, [Melodie McCandless] but, you know, our our landfill is about ready to close, our mile one, and so we are looking at getting [Melodie McCandless] land for our transfer station. And that's I would imagine this is part of that expense is is to expand that transfer station. So the future need. Just the need. [Wendell Williams] Yep. It's showing the need. I think it's important too for a lot of people to understand and might be, you know, watching me later or or that this is, cannot replace anything that we're currently doing. So this is not, like, basically money that we're trying to replace what we're currently spending. This is in addition to. So we're having to show that [Wendell Williams] the amount of TRT we're using towards mitigation does not cover everything. So, for the general public to know this is an additional funds that the state and this is not we're not raising this money. The state is. This is that additional TRT that the state is raising. [Wendell Williams] And so, it's important to kinda reconcile between the two. Doesn't change how we're gonna, recommend our TRT spend for next year. It doesn't change how, [Wendell Williams] our recommendations. This just allows us that secondary fund, to be able to fund our essential services better. [Melodie McCandless] Yeah. I think it's key to show that it's sorry, Jason. It's it's key to show that this is [Melodie McCandless] unreimbursed expenses from visiting a visitor. So it's unpaid visitor related expenses. You know, the EMS and searching s, so those are those two pieces that this is money that we spent [Melodie McCandless] and that we did not get recouped. Yep. Yeah. [Wendell Williams] Our application is basically to demonstrate need, and so that's what this is about. The there are some that are, I mean, to be determined in terms of the amount. [Wendell Williams] I just note that there there's, like, an EMS to provide it with actual I mean, do they or is this a general so, like, under the EMS section, it just talks about the Grand County will be provided with x number of dollars, but it doesn't have a line item there. Do we is that something that we can term it? That part out, maybe. Yeah. That very top line. I saw that This is as well. Yeah. H5H5. [Melodie McCandless] Isn't it? It just says blank. So He said so this is, I think, to the county. Will any portion of the requested funding be shared with or used by a special service district? And we said yes. So then I said, if yes, identify the entity amount purpose and the role. So Grand County MS would be provided with blank, and I think we do need to still fill those in, and so the release would be provided blank. Sure. I think we need to put percentages of the reimbursement because we don't know how much they're gonna give us. So so I don't know what the commissioners think or or administrator, [Melodie McCandless] but I would imagine that this would be like you know, you must be probably a 100% of their revenue, and then special district will also be a 100% because if that they're gonna give us money for that transfer [Stephen Stocks] station. How will we dedicate percentages without knowing the amount and or deciding the amount per [Melodie McCandless] Because per group. They'll be by each entity. We'd be getting money by each entity. I put advantage. Yeah. And I disagree with that, Commissioner McCandless. [Brian Martinez] You know, the the commission here, we split, what, was it $350,000 last year towards EMS costs. We also put another $90,000 towards the funding of a new ambulance as well. So those were costs right here that the that the the commission actually took part of the mitigation right now. So I would think that, you know, rather than using the percentage that we would say that it is, you know, in excess of [Brian Martinez] these funds right here, something like that. And and same way when we look at solid waste as well. So rather than saying, you know, we're gonna give solid waste, you know, $500,000, [Brian Martinez] it would be you know, we're gonna replace the 300 and what was it? I'm sorry. 500,000 that we that we allocated this year to solid waste right here so that those funds are available for all of the other mitigation [Brian Martinez] needs that the county has. [Stephen Stocks] Even if it was to the to the tune of [Stephen Stocks] solid waste, 500,000 back. But we we can go to excess of we can we can go past that with the [Stephen Stocks] with the funds being replaced. We can decide again to give them another 500,000 out of the remaining mitigation past this grant. But [Melodie McCandless] Yeah. We can just give [Stephen Stocks] put it back into Or put it back into mitigation as a total. [Melodie McCandless] Yep. Well, then we can allocate our mitigation from that. I believe that's why that's still empty. We don't have a Yeah. Yeah. [Jason Taylor] Yeah. Jason had a comment. I was just gonna say exactly what you what you said. So [Melodie McCandless] I can speak on behalf of EMS when he was doing this research that in our board meeting the other day, we talked about how we've always thought that visitors [Melodie McCandless] calls are 40% and locals are 60%. But as he was doing this research that even though the calls out, 40% of the calls are are [Melodie McCandless] tourists and 60% are local, but the time and expenses is actually opposite. So for those 40% of calls, you're getting 60% of the expenses. And for those 60% of calls, it's 40% of the expenses. So, really, it is lopsided. So when the community says, well, tourists are costing us more money, it it really is true even though we have that 40% call volume to 60% call volume. That's why expenses are actually different because of the the time spent [Melodie McCandless] and those services that are and I'm sure that surgeon as well surgeon as he's probably majority is Sure. Always has shown us majority is tourism. [Brian Martinez] No. I I I I don't disagree with that at all. The the only thing that I'm saying is is that I think that that our job as the commission is to define where that need is. Right? Because right now what we were we were seeing and what we were saying in this is that there is more need than there are funds available. [Brian Martinez] Right? And so if, you know, search and rest I'm sorry. If EMS has just gotten a a new tax, right, and their their need now is less [Brian Martinez] right now than someone else who does not have the ability as a taxing entity to pull something up, Right? We wanna make we might wanna make sure that we are you're allocating those funds to where the need is greatest rather than rather than based on a percentage. [Wendell Williams] Do we have the total amount of all these with the sheriff and the total amount requested? Yeah. With the 8.5 and the 1.5. Comes to, like, 1.18 [Brian Martinez] is what I added up. [Melodie McCandless] No. The [Wendell Williams] total I'm sorry. With with each one of the amounts that we're requesting, the total amount. Total amount, right, it would be, 12,289,000. [Wendell Williams] And do we have any idea of what other counties are doing in terms of their requests? [Melodie McCandless] Like, are they Said that the knowing the 24,000,000 right now. Just look because they can look at what people are maybe not aren't haven't submitted yet, but what they can look at what's working on, and he mentioned and he's the chair of that board. So our [Melodie McCandless] he mentioned that it was a 24,000,000 Okay. For the communities. 24,000,000, [Brian Martinez] the the total of the R and D work by the Yeah. That was part of the intent of this as well was to start at a state level to be able to actually get a grip on what the what the, emergency service costs are for the state, based on tourism. So that is one of the parts of of this. And, hopefully, you know, this will be moving into, [Brian Martinez] you know, legislation into the future that helps fund some of these services, and we start being able to use these numbers a little bit more effectively. So when yeah. Like you say, like, when we were first like, I kinda [Jason Taylor] talked a lot when, like, when this bill is getting created and stuff, and, you know, that's why they they put that formula in here, you know, that it was, like, for EMS and search and rescue and stuff. Like, how many calls did you go on? You know, how many of those calls did and then of those calls, what were your what were you reimbursed and what were you not reimbursed according to what your costs were? And this was supposed to kinda help [Jason Taylor] cut make up those costs that weren't recovered, you know, so, like, EMS. Someone gets hurt on the white rim or something like that. They have to send an ambulance, but then a helicopter goes and picks them up. We still had to send an they still had to send an ambulance out there. They they're not billing for that, and that was trying to cover those costs of [Jason Taylor] what it would what they spent to drive out there when they put in being a nonrevenue call or whatnot. So Yep. And so that's why I think that, yeah, part of that was to have this [Jason Taylor] this criteria where these where these districts or or people that are applying were supposed to say, this is what we this is how many calls we did. This is what we got reimbursed, and this is the difference. And this what we're asking the state board is that difference. Yeah. And, also, [Brian Martinez] you know, in in in federal discussions as well, one of the discussions right now is so when we look at our mitigation and how our essential services are are funded here in the county, right, they're funded by folks who stay at hotels. [Brian Martinez] Right? So the the people who stay inside of hotels fund our county's entire essential services. Well, not entirely, but the lion's share of our essential services are funded by people staying in hotels. [Brian Martinez] However, we have what is that? Looks like 6,000 campsites inside of Grand County. Right? And those folks do not pay anything into essential services. [Brian Martinez] And if you actually think about it, they are the they are the larger users of the of the resource. Think of the the garbage that you actually create when you're out camping compared to the garbage that you create when you're staying at a hotel. [Brian Martinez] Also, think of the user groups. Right? The people who stay inside hotels as opposed to the folks that are out in the backcountry, right, camping. They're more likely to be actually using the search and rescue services than folks staying inside the hotels. [Brian Martinez] So on a larger layout, like, conversation, this will help give us some numbers when we're having those talks on how do we get folks who are at those campsites to start paying their fair share. Right? Because that's what it really all comes down to. We just wanna make sure that folks are being able or we have a mechanism to say, hey. We want everyone to pay their fair share, not the services. [Wendell Williams] I think this is a great first step too because this is the first [Mary McGann] sorry. Just We're great. I'm sorry. Yeah. I'm sorry. Go ahead, Mary. I just had a question. My understanding is that, [Mary McGann] like, commercial RV camps and such, I do pay TRT. It's just [Mary McGann] Bedroom. BLM and Forest Service. That's what? That's the LA. We have worked I work really closely with, and and it is [Mary McGann] it's very difficult to get federal agencies don't pay taxes. [Mary McGann] So it it kept hitting a wall. We spent a lot of time, especially my first few years, trying to get so that we could get more money for our [Mary McGann] but the nice thing about the BOM campgrounds and such is all the money stays here. None of the money goes out of Grand County. But, okay, I just thought you know, when you were saying that none of them campers [Brian Martinez] I was going, wait. I thought I've been on the federal weapons. Okay. That that I just needed that clarification. Yep. Yep. No. That's good. And then, you know, just just moving that forward. Right? It's how do we come up with a formula. [Brian Martinez] Right? So that inside of their fee structure, right, we can include those fees in the fee structure that they're paying at the camp at the boss. Right? And then figuring out a a mechanism [Brian Martinez] that we can retain those fees so that we can provide those services. Because we are providing services to people that are camping on federal lands, right, to those folks. And that's and that's really what we're trying to figure out. And these numbers, I think I think right here will be very helpful in moving those conversations forward. And I think that's a great idea. I just know it's [Mary McGann] complicated. [Wendell Williams] It was tough. Yeah. I moved it to. I was just gonna say this is probably a long overdue process for all of these departments to kind of now having to have these line items to show, you know, what's what's actual tourist related and what they're being paid for and what they're not. And, also, [Wendell Williams] just a this is the first grant. This is the first time it's ever available. So this is I think the state is probably also figuring this out as well in terms of how this is gonna work. So it doesn't I don't think everything has to be perfect, but I think, you know, we have to be as close to, you know, what we want as possible. [Wendell Williams] But I think it's a great step towards, future grants and just in terms of what we recommend for what TRT has spent on now that we have more of an idea of, you know, the actual [Wendell Williams] spend on choice related costs. [Stephen Stocks] Mike? With that $12,800,000 [Stephen Stocks] handout, we look like we Grand County has the biggest handout to this. I mean, with the $22.22 [Stephen Stocks] to $23,000,000 total ask for, $24,000,000 ask, Grand County's share of it's gonna be or, I mean, our handout's gonna be 12,800,000. [Melodie McCandless] So there's always million available. Is that looking horrible? If Yeah. I mean Well, does it look horrible? In a way, yeah, we're asking for half of the but I don't know if all of them are done. That was just kinda where it was at right now. So that Okay. More money being asked for. Well, I just wanted to know that we, you know, counties. We we we they add up Well, only certain counties are allowed to go for this. You have to have specific, [Melodie McCandless] and and I think Brian lied about the beginning. I don't have it memorized, but only specific counties can go for this grant. It's not available to all 29 counties. Yeah. [Melodie McCandless] And Four through six class. Four through six class. Yeah. Yep. And so we so we don't know what that final goal I mean, I And it does seem like a lot. I think $12,000,000 sounds like a huge ask if we're asked if that's half of the amount of all the counties that are asking, but I also think it shows a need. And that's the purpose [Melodie McCandless] in a way is collecting that data to say, what is the tourism cost in these communities? Grant application, are we clearly stating that this is this is the need, not the ask? [Brian Martinez] There's it's broken that, Mike, into two buckets. Right? So bucket one is your emergency cost. Right? And so those are gonna be prioritized [Brian Martinez] first. But every county will have basically their emergency cost in bucket one. Mhmm. Ours comes to about 1,200,000 [Brian Martinez] on that bucket. Yeah. K? So from that, they will go and they will say, okay. Grand County has 1.2. The other, I don't know, 20 counties that are possibly available for this. Right? They have these these funds. When they're when they're deciding [Brian Martinez] who gets priority on that, they'll start with the smaller communities go first. Number two will be and so then they'll come up with all the smaller communities. And then the second thing that they'll say is, okay. Who had the largest amount of tourism? [Brian Martinez] Right? So those those numbers are asked inside of here. So we'll put the visitation numbers and the the needs inside their notes. Right? So that's number two on the criteria. [Brian Martinez] And then if there's still, you know, more demand than there are funds available, they'll look at, hey. Whose financial need was unable [Brian Martinez] to meet their mitigation costs? And so that's why when I was saying at the beginning of the meeting, we just wanna make sure that we highlight the fact that this year, we did put $1,500,000 [Brian Martinez] more than previous years, right, into essential services than we have done in, you know, in in in the years past. Yeah. Right? So that also shows that there is that financial need right there. And then the rest of it, that bucket too, right, it's it's it's gonna be huge because it's all kinds of things. Road repair, solid waste, all of these other things for these other counties. That that that bucket is going to be large. [Brian Martinez] Right? But it will be broken down into those two, you know, visitor related safety cost and then just this year cost. [Melodie McCandless] Oh, it's almost, yeah, it's almost time for our meeting. We have an 11:00. Okay. Yes. But I think it would be much that MTAB has we'll go to Steven next after you make sure MTAB has the information that you And just very quickly, I don't know if it's applicable anywhere in the application, but to mention how [Wendell Williams] the percentage of of CRT that Grand County brings in is far greater than any of the counties we'll publicly be competing with. So I don't know if that's something that is relevant or we can put into the Well, that's what was gonna ask. Like, is is there, like, a formula? Like, you put x amount in. [Brian Martinez] Are you subject to get x amount out because of that percentage? Or That's why there's priority two inside there. But yeah. I mean, so if you can we could do the math. It's a it's a point 25% [Brian Martinez] tax. Right? We roughly are are are budgeting right around 10,000,000. I think Chantel, we're budgeting right around $10,000,000 this year in. [Brian Martinez] K? And then and 33% of that is going into this grant. So, I mean, we can tell we can find out exactly what we put into this grant. Right. That's right. And and hopefully, we're getting that plus. Plus. Yeah. Right? If we go over $10,000,000, we aren't we don't get qualified for this grant, though. Right? That's what you're Correct. Yeah. Correct. Yeah. So if our goes [Melodie McCandless] up, then we would be excluded [Brian Martinez] from the scrap. And I did do the math actually on that as well if you're interested, which is it's it's a it's a from 10,000,000 to 12,000,000, [Brian Martinez] that's where the delta is. If and I and I actually use the 1,200,000 right there as far as you know? So between 10,000,012 [Brian Martinez] is where that delta is. At 12,000,000, basically, in TRT, we have then then we once again start breaking the positive by that. [Melodie McCandless] Okay. Did Chantel, did you have a number? Okay. Okay. We'll put the end of the Just just an inquiry. [Stephen Stocks] Do we know what percentage, and this may be something that you guys were talking about, what percentage of the total approval that we're pulling from How much we're talking is generated by the county, by Grand County? [Stephen Stocks] I think we just talked about it. That's what you're talking about. Yeah. Once we have that value, I do think that would be able to pool at the letter and say, Grand County generates x percentage of it just to call it out. Not that that makes us entitled to it, but it does. Yeah. It just points the value. Yeah. Kinda hope that that's the information that that board has. Well, when the board's making those decisions, they're gonna be [Melodie McCandless] They should 5,000. 50,000. Right. It's about it. Ask Andy all about it whenever he gets that. [Stephen Stocks] It's a quarter percent. Quarter percent for people. Yeah. 10,000,000, 250,000. [Melodie McCandless] 150,000. [Melodie McCandless] It's not too good. So Well, then we don't wanna figure out. That's all we got. K. Alright. [Melodie McCandless] Thank you. And then just You're gonna take in terms of what Who is next? So the side of the letter. Yep. We'll get We have to move, don't we? Yeah. We're gonna move. So we're gonna take a short recess, and we're gonna Are we gonna do a motion? [Melodie McCandless] No. We don't do motion this evening. This is a workshop. Oh, okay. We'll do motion in our meeting. Then we're to approving the letter in our meeting. Thanks, Oh, okay. [Jason Taylor] Breaks [Melodie McCandless] down tables. I'll make I don't even I think [Stephen Stocks] that our example is I believe what? [Melodie McCandless] I'd like to call the special meeting of the Grand County Commission to order at 11:03 on August 27. And that I would like to stand for the pledge of allegiance. [Melodie McCandless] And those in attendance today are Commissioner, Commissioner McGann, Commissioner McCurry, Commissioner Winfield, myself, Commissioner McCandless, [Melodie McCandless] our county attorney, Stephen Stocks, county administrator, Mark Tyner, our assistant deputy administrator, [Melodie McCandless] Mark Quinn Quinn Hall. And with that, we'll get out. [Jason Taylor] So [Melodie McCandless] So our first order of business today is commission member disclosures and future considerations. [Stephen Stocks] Hang on. Oh, hang on. Hold on. [Stephen Stocks] Okay. Mike. Disclosure. Weisman for the. [Mary McGann] K. My son works for. [Melodie McCandless] Okay. Thank you. And moving on to number three is the consideration of approval of the outdoor recreation mitigation grant application. We just had a workshop with the MTAB [Melodie McCandless] as we discussed this grant. Does anyone have any more comments about it? [Brian Martinez] Yeah. I'd just like to see if we if there was a way that we could add in a statement that, you know, for [Brian Martinez] the 2025 budget that we did allocate all of our TRT mitigation towards essential services [Brian Martinez] as well as our TRCC. [Melodie McCandless] And the interim letter? Correct. Yep. Okay. Are you gonna make a motion to that? I [Bill Winfield] can. Hey, Bill. I move to approve submission of the ORMG grant application as presented with the addition of Commissioner Martinez's [Bill Winfield] comments. [Stephen Stocks] How does that work? Perfect. That, like, went. That was cheap. Okay. Second by Mike. [Melodie McCandless] Any other discussion? [Melodie McCandless] K. All in favor? And that passes five with two absent. [Melodie McCandless] Moving on to number four is a consideration of our 2025 financial audit results. I believe we have our auditor here with us. [Melodie McCandless] And, oh, we have Gabe as well, a third creditor that joined us, Gabe Woytek. Thank you. Where do we wanna start with this one? [Mary McGann] Richie do you wanna have Mike introduce yourself? [Michael Whipple] Okay. Hi. My name is Mike Whipple. I'm a director with Richey May and and then involved, [Michael Whipple] you know, throughout the audit process this year for Grand County. And if you're okay with that, I'll go through some high level points to the financial statements, and then, you know, [Michael Whipple] feel free to interrupt me at any time with, you know, more detailed questions, and we can and see where our discussion leads us, if that's okay with you. [Melodie McCandless] Okay. [Michael Whipple] K. Wonderful. Okay. I'm gonna open up on my I've got open on my screen here a copy of the PDF that we emailed out last night that reflected updates after [Michael Whipple] the you know, a couple of minor corrections after the audit committee went through the financials yesterday, and I appreciate their input there. And may I also say, you know, really appreciate, you know, Gabe and his team and all the, you work and time and, you know, effort it took to respond to all requests and questions as we go through the audits. It is a rigorous process, and we appreciate all their help and and want to acknowledge that. [Michael Whipple] So going to financials to hit, you know, the highest level points first. You know, I'm gonna go to page five of the PDF, which is the independent auditor's report, [Michael Whipple] you know, which is the I mean, the really, after after all the work and effort, this I mean, this is kind of the end result of of it all. You know? And this is you know, the wording here is pretty is mostly standard for for government and reflects a a clean audit opinion. [Michael Whipple] Again, that's a, you know, great job to everyone. That's all, you know, going through an answer from all our questions and getting there and having everything in a state where we can get get comfortable, you know, with the books and get a clean opinion there. [Michael Whipple] One item to call out that's, you know, not standard wording is on pay at the bottom of page five, we have emphasis of the matter. And we've [Michael Whipple] in in the course of RADA, we looked at, you know, a liability on your books for some deferred revenue. So an old COVID era grant that had been there for a few years. As we look through the grant, look through the requirements of the grant, look through the, [Michael Whipple] you know, the rules to recognize revenue for that grant, we determined that it should have been recognized as revenue in the previous year. And so these financials have been updated to reflect as if that grant had been recognized in revenue prior to the 2025, [Michael Whipple] you know, year. And so that didn't affect net income this year. It did affect your, you know, beginning net position on the balance sheet. [Michael Whipple] And there there are other parts of finances that refer to this, we can discuss it more now. We can discuss it more later as I, you know, come to those sections too if if desired. [Brian Martinez] Are you able to discuss that now? Go ahead. I'd be I'd be happy to. Yeah. [Michael Whipple] Okay. So that I think I'm going to go to [Michael Whipple] let's I mean, I guess there's not a whole lot more to to say there other than it I mean, it was well, let's see. I'm gonna go to page 20, actually. [Michael Whipple] Let me or no. Page 21. Excuse me. So page 21 that has the amount there is about it was about $6,000,000. And in a in the past year, it had been received and it got gone to your you received the cash, and so they increased your cash account. [Michael Whipple] And the offset was to a liability, you know, called unearned rep revenue where where it will sit where it would sit until it was recognized into revenue. In this particular grant, you know, the we looked at the requirements, and there's nothing that said that you needed to wait, [Michael Whipple] you know, for to for you to spend it for you to recognize that revenue. And so that that was an error in the past year that that wasn't caught, that, you know, we [Brian Martinez] money was to be spent? [Michael Whipple] Sorry. Can you repeat your question, please, Commissioner? [Melodie McCandless] Microphone. Can you use microphone? Oh, yeah. [Brian Martinez] Thanks, Mike. Can you go over the requirements of how that money was to be spent? I wasn't a Commissioner when back in COVID when this was awarded. [Michael Whipple] Okay. Yeah. I'd be happy to. Brandon, would you I see Brandon Keyes from my office has also joined us. Brandon, would you be okay to speak to the, you know, purpose of that grant, you know, that had the restatement on the 2025 financial statements? [Brandon Keyes] Yeah. So I I reviewed it at a high level, but I the one who reviewed it is not with us right now. He's on PTO. But my understanding is it's a COVID relief grant [Brandon Keyes] that when the funds were brought in back in 2223, there are different tranches of it meant for [Brandon Keyes] just to continue to help with some of the efforts on COVID during that time frame. So we saw the money come in. We believe the money had been earned because of the triggering requirements in that grant. [Brandon Keyes] But if you if we can get into further details, I can maybe get you a a better synopsis of that maybe after this meeting where where they were actually spent, [Brandon Keyes] because that that individual would have that information. [Brian Martinez] Yesterday, you made a a statement that, the county, [Brian Martinez] deferred to '20 the funds from '24 to '25. Would that have been done in '24? Because as a Commissioner, I never deferred [Brian Martinez] funds from '24 to '25. And so I just wanna know where that decision was made or who made that decision. When you say the counting, I I I imagine you're speaking to this body. [Brandon Keyes] I we know that it was deferred in 2024. I believe it was deferred prior to that as well, though. If you wanna give me just one minute, I can quickly check that for you. [Michael Whipple] And I guess part of what was brought up yesterday, we when we were discussing it, we, you know, we as as auditors required to reach out whenever we have a restatement to reach out to the predecessor auditor, which in this case was Larson & Company and bring to their attention, you know, the [Michael Whipple] you know, our reasons for wanting to restate and, you know, in getting their I mean, sort of getting their input on it. [Michael Whipple] And, know, I I don't think he intended to be necessarily read out loud word for word. We did communicate with John Hatterley who who led the audit last year and brought this to his attention and brought our reasons for [Michael Whipple] restating. And his comment was that he'd read on the the recognition and and restatement. You know, his documentation indicated that indicated [Michael Whipple] that the county preferred to defer until 2025 when they spent the funds to recognize it. [Michael Whipple] And but he didn't have more detail on that. And I guess at at this time, I don't have more detail on the reason why there was a preference at a time to defer it, but that didn't [Michael Whipple] jive with the accounting rules that, you know, government's. [Brian Martinez] With this commission right here, the statement yesterday from for mister Hapley was I should have caught this. [Stephen Stocks] No. [Bill Winfield] The the LA CTF funds, I might have that [Bill Winfield] abbreviation incorrect, were twenty two and twenty three funds, and they were identified, on my first year as a Commissioner that they had come in. The first year of those had come into the county, and the second year was getting ready to, and this came about from [Bill Winfield] some work by some senators. I believe it started in Montana and then, of course, went to the federal level, and this money came back. So I guess I'm a little curious. [Bill Winfield] We received that money. The it came in split in two years, half and half. So, basically, 2,500,000 [Bill Winfield] one year and 2.5 the next year would have been 2023, why we're clear pushing receiving that money into '25. [Bill Winfield] So I don't think we need to delve into that right now, but I think it needs looked into why that's getting pushed two plus years [Bill Winfield] down the road to where we're, accepting or or showing that that revenue came in. It seems, something seems a little bit off there to me. So [Brandon Keyes] And I did look at the reporting. It looks like this first was reported back in the 12/31/2023 financials. [Brandon Keyes] And so it was there for '23, there for '24, and our conclusion was that it should have been recognized prior to that. Yeah. [Brian Martinez] Brian, did you get answers on that one when we move along? Yeah. We can we we can continue on unless you guys have anything else you'd like to say about that. [Michael Whipple] Okay. I don't have any more detail at this time, so I will I will move forward. And okay. So the [Michael Whipple] I I think that covers the audit opinion there, which, you know, reflects your financial statement audit, the additional compliance testing over the federal funds received, you know, chiefly for the airport. [Michael Whipple] And that's so that's the clean opinion there. I'm going to jump ahead quite a few pages. I'm going to jump ahead [Michael Whipple] to page 90 to and as your you know, our audit report has several, I mean, several opinion reports in it. Page 90 is our report on internal control [Michael Whipple] over financial reporting and on compliance and other matters, you know, based on audit in accordance with government auditing standards. So this is the next report required for, you know, government audits and and similar audits. [Michael Whipple] So this one goes through, you know, if we identified any issues with internal control for compliance over internal control generally for financial reporting. [Michael Whipple] And and it defines a few words in there. The you know, it calls one, and it one that defines the material weakness, which is, [Michael Whipple] you know, some kind of, you know, breakdown in process or where, you know, something material to financials, which material means big enough that it could, [Michael Whipple] you know, affect financial statement users' decisions with, you know, would not, you know, prevent such an error in from happening or or being caught and corrected [Michael Whipple] are the the keywords there as far as, you know, material weaknesses or significant deficient deficiencies. We don't necessarily go looking for those. As as part of your audit, we do look at your internal controls and processes [Michael Whipple] and consider what effect it will have on our, you know, our auditing, you know, our testing procedures and and adapt our testing procedure accordingly. [Michael Whipple] And so in the course of the audit, we found a couple matters that, you know, areas for improvement that were significant enough that we said, okay. These are [Michael Whipple] you know, these would be, you know, significant would be material weaknesses. And we reference them there, but we don't define them further. Those those get defined later on, I believe, on page 98. [Michael Whipple] So that's, you know, not we didn't have any issues with compliance, and I'll get, you know, get more into compliance in a second. [Michael Whipple] So I could talk about those, you know, deficiencies now now if you would like, or I can go through them linearly if you you know, what would be your preference or how I shall proceed here? [Brian Martinez] Mr. Whipple, do you mind if I just make a clarification? I just want to make sure that I got that correct of what you just stated. So there are there are two deficiencies, [Brian Martinez] basically. There's significant deficiency, which is basically what it sounds like, and then there is material weakness. [Brian Martinez] And material weakness is worse than a significant deficiency. Is that correct? [Michael Whipple] Correct. [Brian Martinez] Okay. And that the county has three of those material weaknesses? [Michael Whipple] That that is correct. [Brian Martinez] And those were persistent through not just '25, but needed to be restated from '24. So we [Brian Martinez] is that correct? [Michael Whipple] The twenty four twenty twenty four restatement did play into that. Yes. [Brian Martinez] Okay. And so [Brian Martinez] that was not the scope of this audit. Correct? That's these are just these were just these were just items that you ran into during [Brian Martinez] the course of conducting the audit for the state compliance and the federal compliance. Is that correct? Yes. That is correct. Okay. Thank you very much. [Melodie McCandless] Did you have any more to add, Michael? [Michael Whipple] I I do. Just whether I want we wanna I guess, just what the order is we wanna talk through things. I guess, maybe I'll jump ahead since since we are on the topic. [Michael Whipple] Let's jump to page ninety ninety nine. Let's so let's talk about these, and then I'll jump backwards in a second. [Michael Whipple] Okay. So, you know, number one, you know, prior period restatements. So part of our [Michael Whipple] I mean, as we go through the audit and, I guess, in auditing and accounting theory, you know, in theory, you know, the auditor should, you know, not never should find any misstatements. [Michael Whipple] You know, they they should always be, you know, corrected and caught before they come to the auditor since we're outside of your organization. If you have small adjustments, [Michael Whipple] you know, even those are you know, those don't rise to the level of these matters that we've discussed. Those because many, many governance, clients, companies have have those kind of small adjustments that are [Michael Whipple] not as big a deal. The bigger they are, at at some point, they get big enough that we, you know, can't ignore them. You know, they're, you know, they're just we have to we have to bring them to your attention. We have to bring them to your attention in writing. [Michael Whipple] And so that's part of why these are, you know, why these are here. So that COVID COVID error money, you know, 6,000,000 of that, you know, should have been recognized in the previous year but was but was not. And, I mean, that's part of why that [Michael Whipple] I mean, that's just big enough. You know, it's material enough to your financial statements that it, you know, it that's a material error. It and it wasn't caught, so that's a material weakness, [Michael Whipple] you know, by by definition. And so that is that is just a little more color on finding number one there on page 99. And so we [Michael Whipple] 99 breaks it down and goes through, you know, the required elements for finding for for government audit going through, you know, the criteria, the condition that led to it, what caused the effect, [Michael Whipple] our recommendation. It also includes an opportunity for for management to respond there, and that's the last one that, you know you know, Gabe was able to give us yesterday, we incorporated the report there. [Michael Whipple] You know, has his, you know, you know, his response and which, you know, sometimes the the manager can respond and say, we we disagree with the auditor. We disagree with this finding, and this is why, [Michael Whipple] you know, is an option to to respond. And in this case, that's you know, Gabe did not, you know, give us that response. You acknowledge it here, and you've got that there. [Michael Whipple] So that I mean, that's finding number one there. You know, questions or comments? Or [Bill Winfield] I've got a question on three when you get those. Okay. And just just still my question [Brian Martinez] of is is when you say that the county deferred that, I still and and I understand that that's not in the scope of of this audit. I I I can pass this off to the internal auditor as well. I just wanna know who who made that decision to defer that off. Was that where that happened at? [Melodie McCandless] And I when I was watching the meeting yesterday, he did say our internal auditor was going was looking into this. [Michael Whipple] Yeah. Yep. [Brian Martinez] 171. I don't know if I don't know if there we on this finding right here, I don't know if we pushed this to the internal auditor or not in He said it was already in his scope when I watched it yesterday. [Brian Martinez] On on this finding? Yeah. Okay. [Michael Whipple] I mean, I'll I'll read a little bit from John's email, which, again, I I don't know if John, you know, Hatterley of Larson intended his email to be read, you know, out loud word for word. But as I that's my only source for the the answer here. You know, his his comment was the conversations [Michael Whipple] may have occurred between Squire and Gabe regarding the different revenue, but he is kind of vague. He wasn't sure on that one. So I I unfortunately can't give you more information at this time on, you know, why that decision was made. [Brian Martinez] Okay. I'm gonna move on to the next one. And just an important thing, Mike, from this right here that I get is, you know, the when I look at it, we've had to restate our financials in 2022. [Brian Martinez] We had to restate our financials in 2023, and now we've had to restate our financials in 2024. And, you know, this was the historical [Brian Martinez] data right here that, you know, this commission had to build the budget off of for our 2025 budget. [Michael Whipple] Okay. Noted, and that's good context now. Thank you. [Brandon Keyes] Yeah. Maybe I'll just add one little piece to it. And and I understand how frustrating that's gotta be to have to go through these restatements and having them redo budgets and amend them. [Brandon Keyes] One thing to maybe consider going forward is this does impact your general fund budget. And there's a compliance finding that or not a finding. Sorry. A compliance requirement [Brandon Keyes] that this could potentially cause a problem for next year's audit given that we've just added $5,700,000 to your general fund budget. [Brandon Keyes] And so we gotta make sure that we're paying attention to that, and that's something I can talk to, you know, Gabe or whoever would like to on this audit committee maybe after this call It's just to make sure you're aware of, like, the ramifications could potentially come up as you guys are working through the budget for next year because that is a new fund balance number. So just wanted to make sure you're aware of that. Something we're we're keeping an eye on and wanna make sure we don't run to a a problem for next year's audit with that piece alone. [Brian Martinez] Yeah. Thanks for that, Randy. You're welcome. [Michael Whipple] Okay. I'll move on to, [Michael Whipple] you know, finding number two, you know, regarding financial records and account reconciliations. [Stephen Stocks] Okay. [Michael Whipple] And then when I was starting to say, know, we really are appreciative of Gabe and his team and all the effort, all the questions we had, you know, going through all our audit audit inquiries and all the work going there too. [Michael Whipple] There were some challenges, and they and they did add up over time. You know, there have been questions posed to us, you know you know, [Michael Whipple] know, by the audit committee and, you know, why why did the audit take so long, you know, what challenges does your team face. And there's [Michael Whipple] I mean, we in this in our finding here, it kinda reflects that we went you know, I guess, let me tell you a little bit about how we audit. You know, we we get a copy of your trial balance. [Michael Whipple] You know, every material balance requires some kind of audit procedure over it, and we, you know, you know, make our audit plan, and then and then we audit it. You know, see you know, an example I use is accounts receivable. [Michael Whipple] But what does an auditor do to audit accounts receivable? You know, the first step is ask for, you know, a schedule showing all those accounts receivable [Michael Whipple] owed to the county. This is all money that you are owed. And the the very first thing we do with that schedule is we see, does it tie to the trial balance? Does it tie to the accounts that we are auditing? [Michael Whipple] And if it does not, then that presents a problem because we just I mean, I still don't know how it's you know, if it doesn't tie and it doesn't tie by a lot, it's not auditable. [Michael Whipple] And so then, okay. Well, now what do we do? So the you know, Gabe and team had to work with Caselle on that one. That one was a software issue where Caselle was doing some strange things with applying deposits. [Michael Whipple] And so the, you know, accounts receivable was way different than the balances on the books. And after some back and forth and some time passing, you know, Gabe and and his team were able to resolve with Caselle, [Michael Whipple] and we were able to get a schedule that, you know, in Tide, and we were able to audit that and get comfortable with that. I mean, that's I mean, one example and all that, you know, took time, took extra effort, and, you know, [Michael Whipple] you know, when we come in there and just the first pass, you know, the schedule of the time, you know, is a problem. And as as we as we went through all the audit areas, it seems like we'd have kinda similar analogous challenges with [Michael Whipple] almost every audit area that we looked into, whether it's cash or fixed assets, compensated absences, or [Michael Whipple] and, debt. I'm not sure that we found an area that we just said, yeah. Yeah. Everything clicked here. It went through clean. It went through here quick. [Michael Whipple] So there, you know, there was a lot of back and forth, a lot of, you know, research by Gabe and his team as to, you know, why things were not tying and how to get there. [Michael Whipple] And so the I mean, the aggregate of all this is that, you know, the the way we look at things when we're tying out the balances to sporting schedules doesn't [Michael Whipple] you know, the way things are being reconciled, it wasn't, you know, it wasn't in a a good form to make it a, you know, an easy, clean way to work through the through each other area. We got there. We got there by the end, you know, by now. And but it it was it was a challenge, and it did add a lot of extra time to work there. And so that's where we have to [Michael Whipple] have kind of fairly broad, you know, material weakness there about how, you know, the reconciling of the the period end accounts worked and all the the time the schedules to period end balances all worked. [Michael Whipple] And I'll open that up for questions. [Melodie McCandless] Okay. [Brian Martinez] Move on to number three. Just one quick question. And was this it says significant the significant effort was placed in this portion. Was it significant or the majority of your guys' time that was what that was dealing with reconciliations? [Brian Martinez] I mean, I think that you mentioned yesterday, I mean, that went down all the way down to cash balances. [Michael Whipple] Is that correct? That is correct. Yes. Yeah. That this would be this was a [Michael Whipple] yeah. This significant's good work. This is a lot of this was a lot of extra work we did not originally envision as we, you know you know, bid on your audit last fall and and were brought on, you know, onboarded as your as your new auditors. So this was, you know, beyond above and beyond the the normal scope of, you know, finance David audit [Michael Whipple] that we did not originally anticipate. [Brian Martinez] And and I and I do just once again appreciate Brandon's comments yesterday in the audit meeting on [Brian Martinez] how we'll be moving forward next year. And so those were appreciated. [Brandon Keyes] Oh, thank you. [Melodie McCandless] So finding three. [Michael Whipple] Yeah. Moving forward. So finding number three, there was a another restatement [Michael Whipple] of sorts of on the financial statements. So in the course of, you know, preparing and drafting the financial statements, which also involved, you know, making sure things were consistent with prior year, we became aware that there is a fiduciary fund, fund number 71, [Michael Whipple] which was, you know, not included at all in last year's financial statements. It it has a balance about of about $8,000,000, [Michael Whipple] you know, in cash and assets, and it bounced about $8,000,000 in liabilities. So on on the one hand, omitting it fund from the financials had no effect on last year's net position or net income, [Michael Whipple] but it is something that's required to be included and and was not there at all last year. And and we we corresponded with with John Hadley of Larson about it, and he agreed that it [Michael Whipple] should have been there. And it was its omission wasn't oversight, but it was, you know, never caught, you know, at at any stage. And so this is that's another material weakness to have a, you know, an 8,000,000 million dollar fund, which is on the books. It's on the trial balance, but it was not included in the financial state the final financial statements from last year. [Michael Whipple] And so that's your weakness here. And I'll open up for questions. I've [Bill Winfield] got a question unless I'm stepping on somebody else's toe. Under condition, [Bill Winfield] the second sentence, it says county personnel. Is that a mistake? Should that be the clerk auditor or or county personnel? [Bill Winfield] What what what's the explanation there is what I'm looking for? [Michael Whipple] I mean, you you know, Gabe was the, you know, lead contact, and our our questions went through Gabe. And so on the one hand, you probably could the statement, I think, would be correct. You said county clerk, [Michael Whipple] you know, just, you know, describing it. Actually, don't remember what or let me sorry. Let me [Michael Whipple] I mean, we talked a lot with Gabe about this. I can't remember if the treasurer brought this up or not. No. I'm sorry. I'm mixing up things. I mean so I I mean, we discussed we discussed with Gabe, so we could put in, you know, county clerk, and that would be a correct sentence. [Michael Whipple] I mean, I guess, in my mind, as I read that sentence, county clerk and county personnel will be fairly synonymous. I mean, we could we could [Michael Whipple] I mean, we we could change that if you'd like. [Bill Winfield] It it it isn't something whether I like or not. I was just curious if county personnel were involved in this. My [Bill Winfield] my concern is that we're going back and saying that mister Hatterley has admitted that he should have had this in last year's audit. [Bill Winfield] And I know that we asked the internal auditor to look into how long this fund has been in existence. So it could be that it should have been in [Bill Winfield] the previous three years' audits. And, also, it's never been on a budget [Bill Winfield] that I've worked on that I'm aware of. So I I don't think that it's just that mister Hatterley missed this. There's clearly an issue that this fund 71 [Bill Winfield] hasn't been public to the commission and that funds have gone through it. Now I'm not saying that funds have been misused through it, [Bill Winfield] but I'm hoping this is the only one and that we found it and that it's out now for the commission to work on. But it it seems a little bit odd to me, I guess, is where I'm coming from. [Melodie McCandless] Brian? [Brian Martinez] Yeah. And just, you know, one by one, I think I understand them. But, you know, to me, it's the the the difficulty, and and I just applaud you guys for for finding this and then bringing this out into the open. It's it's the way that the whole system plays together. [Brian Martinez] Right? It's the environment that that's created inside of it. You know, you have you have $5,700,000 that's been floating around since COVID. [Brian Martinez] You have a lack of of oversight on reconciliations, especially as far as the process of [Brian Martinez] how was it put inside there? It was, like, due to and due from. Right? So the moving around of of money inside there. And then we find out that there's a a fund that we never knew about that had $8,700,000. [Brian Martinez] And I know that it's a custodial fund and that it is you know, and it nets out to zero. But, you know, a custodial fund still means that this commission is responsible for those funds. And so to not know about 8,700,000 [Brian Martinez] an $8,700,000 fund is concerning to me. So I I just wanna thank you guys and appreciate you for bringing this forward, and and I'm sure that we'll be looking forward to some answers and some recommendations [Brian Martinez] coming from our internal auditor on on, some of the things that you've brought to life. [Brandon Keyes] Thank you for that. [Melodie McCandless] K. So you'd mentioned someone went forward into the findings, and you wanted to go backwards somewhere else in the audit? [Michael Whipple] Yes. I'll go backwards to [Michael Whipple] let's see, so I'll go backwards to page 92 now. So I think we've addressed everything that was on pages ninety and ninety one. Page 92. [Gabriel Woytek] Can I speak? Yes. Chair, can I may I speak, chair? Okay. So with with regards to custodial fund, fund 71, [Gabriel Woytek] it it feels to me like the conversation's really getting carried away as it relates to how it relates to the budget. I I appreciate the the desire to to sort of be aware of all of these funds that are coming in and out. [Gabriel Woytek] But the custodial funds, just to give I mean, it it seems like we're not speaking directly as to what those funds are. And so those are subdivision [Gabriel Woytek] bonds held. Those are commissary funds that are held from the from jail inmates. I mean, let let's talk about how we would budget for the amount of commissary funds we're holding from jail inmates. [Gabriel Woytek] I mean, let let's talk in practical sense what we're actually talking about and not get carried away with this narrative about how this this is some sort of [Gabriel Woytek] this is some sort of irresponsible budgeting practice. I I'm I'm a little bit confused about how this narrative is getting carried away. Thank you. [Melodie McCandless] Thank you. I think it's just that it was not in the last year's budget or last year's [Gabriel Woytek] audit report. Well, I I would ask the commissioners be a little bit more, you know, conscientious about how they're how they're choosing to speak about their own organization's books. Thank you. [Melodie McCandless] Okay. So we're on page 92? [Michael Whipple] Yes. [Melodie McCandless] So [Michael Whipple] page 92. As part of our audit of your county, we are required to do certain procedures over compliance, [Michael Whipple] which are published by the state auditor. State auditor gives a nice guide for all the audit firms to go through the various areas of compliance they want us to look at and even and even has suggested procedures to look at. And so this report is reporting on on the results of that testing. [Michael Whipple] So we there are certain areas that we test every single year. We're required to test every year. And there's certain areas where, you know, required to test every three years, and so we can spread that testing over several years to, you know, ease the burden a little bit on on us and [Michael Whipple] on on you as you as we work through these things. And so the the report lists the areas that we looked at this year, and this report is a clean report. You know, we went through the our testing of state compliance, and we did not have any findings. And so good great job. Great job, everyone. You know, this is, [Michael Whipple] you know, you know, this is a clean, you know, opinion on on your state compliance. Ahead in the financials on the very left, page one zero three. [Michael Whipple] You know, in following government auditing standards, government accounting rules, you know, we do have to repeat, you know, the findings from the previous year. And, you know, so those are the two findings that, you know, that you have from last year's audit about budgetary compliance and deficit fund balance. [Michael Whipple] And I will call attention to the the final clause of both those current status, you know, where it says finding has been resolved and no repeat finding as of 12/31/2025, [Michael Whipple] you know, for both of those. So so great job. Good job. You know, we didn't we looked at those this year, and, you know, we concluded that you were compliant and on those and all the other areas [Michael Whipple] and for state compliance. So that I'll open up for questions or comments on [Michael Whipple] on this report. Mary? [Mary McGann] Am I I'm hearing you right. You're saying that, it was a clean audit [Mary McGann] and that, we are in compliance. It's Yes. Am I correct? Yes. [Melodie McCandless] Thank you. Okay. [Melodie McCandless] Any other questions, comments? [Gabriel Woytek] Do I have a motion? Well, if I if I could speak, chair, one more time just to you know? [Gabriel Woytek] So I I guess, I'll just have to say, you're welcome for delivering a cleared audit. I guess it's up to me to say thank you to all the hardworking county personnel that worked over six months [Gabriel Woytek] through a rigorous process onboarding a brand new firm into this audit process. The effort put forth by Grand County offices in pushing through and working towards these financial statements is a great accomplishment. [Gabriel Woytek] Grand County continues to show improvements year over year and continues to do an exemplary job with the resources and capacity at its disposal. [Gabriel Woytek] This audit contains zero opinions and zero compliance findings. It is a clean audit. It's the cleanest audit we've seen in quite some time. An audit without recommendations [Gabriel Woytek] or areas for improvement that are identified is hardly useful, and I welcome the guidance that's identified in this audit to to introduce [Gabriel Woytek] more improvements and interpret the aspects of this audit constructively. So I wanna just thank, in particular, I wanna name all of the folks that have worked tirelessly [Gabriel Woytek] that that are the people that make this county run. I'm talking about Jenny Beth. I'm talking about Chantel, Chris Williams, Emily Valentine, Chris Kauffman, [Gabriel Woytek] Lily Houghton, Christina Bachus, Tess Barger, Laura Allred, Angie Mortensen. These are the people that make this county go, and I really thank them for all of their tireless effort and what is really a rigorous and not easy process. Thank you. [Melodie McCandless] I appreciate that. Thank you, Gabe. Thanks for calling all those people out. I appreciate them and you. Mary? [Mary McGann] I move I move to approve the 2025 [Mary McGann] financial audit as presented by, Richey May. And and I wonder, chair, maybe the county attorney, but shouldn't that verbiage be accept or adopt [Bill Winfield] rather than approve. [Mary McGann] It makes more sense. That makes a lot more sense. Yes. So I will amend my motion to say I move to accept the 2025 [Mary McGann] financial audit as presented by Richey May and to express my appreciation to the staff who created a clean, [Mary McGann] compliant report, audit. Thank you. I'll second that. Okay. [Melodie McCandless] Any other comments? [Bill Winfield] Yeah. I'd like to make a comment. [Bill Winfield] Okay. I, I think that it's worth going back and watching the audit committee meeting for the people that didn't. And with auditor, I mean, I understand your frustrations, [Bill Winfield] and I understand the hard work that you've put in here. But regardless of the fact that this is a clean audit, there's some problems in here, [Bill Winfield] and we have been working on trying to make some changes for the last four years of my commission. [Bill Winfield] And I appreciate the fact, your responses. I read through your responses this morning, and I appreciate the responses you put in there because they aren't pushed back. [Bill Winfield] They're let's fix this. And that's what I'm about. Let's fix some of the mistakes, some of the problems that exist here, some of the weaknesses that we have, and some of the lack of transparency. [Bill Winfield] And I'm not saying that that came from you, sir. I'm simply saying that there is a lot of homework and cleanup that we need to do when we have the previous external auditor [Bill Winfield] admit that he made mistakes and left things out. And when we change auditors, we have commissioners who fight tooth and nail to keep that from happening, [Bill Winfield] and yet we still move forward here. So I I think it's important that we understand, and I I understand where you're coming from, your frustrations, Gabe. I truly do, but we have frustrations. [Bill Winfield] I have frustrations. And the fact that we're here two months after this should have been done, that's a frustration on our end. So I don't don't wanna push back. [Bill Winfield] I appreciate the staff and the hard work that everybody does here, and I don't think you can ever find a time that I don't appreciate you or staff. [Bill Winfield] But I also know that we have a job to do, we all do, and part of it's having this done and having it done on time. And so let's let's move forward and make those corrections. Again, thank you for your responses specifically. [Melodie McCandless] K. We have a first and a second. Paula in favor? That path is five with two absent. [Melodie McCandless] And with that, [Melodie McCandless] you can adjourn this meeting at 11:42. [Melodie McCandless] Thank you. [Brandon Keyes] Thank you, everybody, for your time. Thank you. Thank you, guys. Speaker identifications in the transcript are automated and may contain errors. Please refer to the video for verification. Agenda Summary Outdoor Recreation Mitigation Grant application workshop with the Moab Tourism Advisory Board Commissioners and the Moab Tourism Advisory Board spent an hour reviewing Grand County's application to a new state grant that reimburses rural counties for what tourism costs their emergency services, roads and landfills — a request totaling $12,289,077. The Outdoor Recreation Mitigation Grant was created by HB 456, the 2025 bill that also raised the cap on county transient room tax by a quarter percent. Roughly a third of that quarter-percent flows into the grant fund, which Commissioner Brian Martinez told the board stands at about $6.6 million statewide. Eligibility is limited to counties in Utah’s fourth through sixth classes — the state’s population-based tiers for its least-populous counties, Grand among them — rather than all 29. The application splits into two tiers. The first covers unreimbursed emergency costs and is funded first: $242,367 in unpaid search and rescue, $254,486 in ongoing search and rescue, $695,000 in unpaid emergency medical services, and $250,000 in safety-related road repair. The second tier covers broader visitor-related costs: $8.5 million for solid waste, $1,597,225 for law enforcement and $750,000 for road repairs tied to emergency access. The largest single line, the $8.5 million solid waste request, would go toward expanding the Canyonlands Transfer Station as the Moab Class IV Landfill approaches closure. The application states that no cost estimate or supporting documentation was uploaded for that item. Read the county's grant application → Board members and commissioners returned repeatedly to how the ask would look to the state. Requests statewide were described in the meeting as totaling roughly $24 million, which would make Grand County's share about half. Participants framed the application as documenting need rather than expecting full funding, and noted the county would lose eligibility altogether if its transient room tax revenue exceeded $10 million — a threshold the county is budgeting close to this year. Two gaps surfaced during the review. The application's fields naming how much would pass through to Grand County EMS and to Solid Waste Special Service District No. 1 were still blank, and participants agreed they needed to be filled in. MTAB chair Wendell Williams said the board had been presented with the application only that morning. Supporting data cited during the workshop included an emergency medical services finding that visitors account for about 40 percent of call volume but roughly 60 percent of cost. Commissioner Mary McGann noted that commercial RV parks do pay the tax, and that federal agencies do not. No vote was taken during the workshop. The state requires an acknowledgment letter from a county's tourism tax advisory board confirming it knows the county is applying; the letter signed for this application is dated the day of the meeting. Watch the video ↑ · View agenda packet → Consideration of approval of Outdoor Recreation Mitigation Grant (ORMG) application The commission approved submitting the grant application, adding a statement that the county directed all of its transient room tax mitigation money and its tourism, recreation, cultural and convention tax toward essential services in the 2025 budget. The state's application window closes September 30. Vote: 5-0. Commissioners Trisha Hedin and Jacques Hadler were absent. Watch the video ↑ · View agenda packet → Consideration of 2025 financial audit results Grand County's 2025 audit came back with a clean opinion and no state compliance findings, alongside three material weaknesses — the most serious category of internal control problem an auditor reports. Michael Whipple, an assurance director at Richey May, presented the audit. The county hired the firm last fall, replacing Larson & Company. The first weakness concerns a COVID-era federal relief grant of about $5.7 million that was carried on the books as unearned revenue and should have been recognized in an earlier year. Correcting it required restating the prior year's financial statements. Whipple said the grant's terms contained nothing requiring the county to wait until it spent the money to recognize it. Richey May notified the Larson & Company partner who led the previous audit, who indicated his documentation showed the county preferred to defer recognition until 2025. Commissioners asked who made that decision; no one at the meeting could say, and the county's internal auditor is reviewing it. The second weakness concerns account reconciliations. Whipple said supporting schedules did not tie to the county's trial balance across nearly every area examined — cash, fixed assets, compensated absences and debt among them — and that the accounts receivable discrepancy traced to the county's Caselle accounting software misapplying deposits. The issues were resolved, but added substantial time beyond the scope the firm bid. The third weakness concerns fund 71, a custodial account holding money the county does not own — developer subdivision bonds and jail inmate commissary balances. It carries roughly $8 million in assets against roughly $8 million in liabilities. Whipple said the fund sat on the county's trial balance the whole time but was left out of last year's published financial statements entirely. Because the assets and liabilities offset, the omission did not change the county's reported net position; the fund was nonetheless required to be included, and the predecessor auditor agreed it should have been. Clerk/Auditor Gabriel Woytek called it the cleanest audit the county has seen in some time and named a dozen staff who worked on it. Vice Chair Bill Winfield, who said the commission has been working on changes for four years, drew a line between the opinion and the findings: “Regardless of the fact that this is a clean audit, there’s some problems in here.” He said the report arrived two months later than it should have, and credited the firm for responses that read as “let’s fix this” rather than pushback. Two findings from the prior year's audit — budgetary compliance and a deficit fund balance — were resolved and did not repeat. The motion was amended from approving the audit to accepting it. Vote: 5-0. Commissioners Trisha Hedin and Jacques Hadler were absent. Watch the video ↑ · View agenda packet → Next Meeting The commission's previous meeting was August 18. The Grand County Commission's next regular meeting is Tuesday, September 15, at the Grand County Commission Chambers, 125 E. Center St. See something that needs correcting? Email [email protected]. Meeting summaries are prepared from official agendas and transcripts — please refer to the meeting recording for verification. Search all Grand County Commission meeting records — transcripts, votes, and summaries — at the Moab Sun News Local Government hub → This story is part of our Local Government coverage. See all 424 stories → Also part of: Bill Winfield, Brian Martinez, Gabriel Woytek, Grand County Budget, Grand County Commission, grand county ems, Jacques Hadler, Mary McGann, Search and Rescue, Tourism, Transient Room Tax, Trisha Hedin Documents & Sources Resources From our Local Government hub Stay Updated Get updates on Local Government news delivered to your inbox.