Monroe City Gets Poor Rating in Audit

An audit of Monroe City released Thursday by the state auditor’s office gave the city a rating of “poor”, the lowest possible. The report cites a five-year contract, starting in 2018, of at least $3.2 million with a private company to operate the water and sewer systems. The audit found the city did not perform a cost-benefit analysis beforehand to determine if the contract would save taxpayer money and did not solicit competitive proposals. The report also said the city could not justify the transfer of $150,000 each from the electric and gas funds to the general fund to avoid a deficit balance. Those funds were also used to make two loans totaling $788,000 to the industrial development fund. The report also criticized the city for not updating contracts for operation of the golf course and with the Monroe City Area Fire Protection District; for not doing a formal review of natural gas rates since 2000; and inadequate controls and procedures for payroll processing, real estate transactions, economic incentives, bidding, preparation of the annual budget, fire service billing and collection, and electronic data security.