It's all starting to add up

1/8/2016 8:19:00 AM It's all starting to add up Town's finances are better after 3 shaky years + click to enlarge News staff photo by Tara Vocino Templeton Town Accountant Kelli Pontbriand is pleased with the progress that’s been made since Abrahams Group Consultant Lee Brown came on board last month. The town is almost prepared to do a fiscal 2013 audit. Tara Vocino Reporter TEMPLETON — The town’s finances are coming along steadily as town employees attempt to restore conditions dating as far back as fiscal 2013 so that an audit can be done. According to interim Town Administrator Bob Markel, it was “the perfect storm” of  job turnover and software issues that caused the town’s finances to be in disarray. Positions became vacant when employees who were not doing satisfactory work were terminated in 2013. The town was forced to switch accounting software when the former town accountant suddenly left. And now they have to work through correcting the software links that weren’t set up properly. “The town’s full-time ac­countant left, a series of part-time people came in but were terminated for not properly doing their job,” he said. “The town used City and Town previously, and switched over to Vadar, which is standard (software) for smaller communities.” They brought in Lee Brown, a consultant for Abrahams Group, out of Framingham, to prepare the town’s records for the audit. Mr. Markel called the job an enormous undertaking. He said the accounting group specializes in reconstructing financial records. According to President Mark Abrahams, they are preparing the town’s records so that the audit can be done by ensuring that cash and receipts are recorded, posting to the cash book, posting to the general ledger, ensuring the cash book reconciles to the bank statements and the general ledger reconciles to the cash book. Mr. Brown came to Templeton about four weeks ago. He estimated the firm will be there into the spring. Matthew S. Hunt, CPA, will then conduct the audit. Mr. Markel expects the 2013 audit to be ready at the end of the month. He said fiscal 2014 will be easier and that fiscal 2015 is in reasonably good shape. “We conducted a conference call in late December, and we were told by the auditor that we needed some additional information beyond a general ledger,” Mr. Markel said. “They wanted a subsidiary ledger for expenditures and revenues. Since they’re a very professional firm, that’s what they required.” According to Town Ac­countant Kelli Pontbriand, who took the job in December 2014, that’s a very tedious and time-consuming process. “There are missing transactions that they didn’t put into the software, and we have to pull all the stuff together to research where they are now,” Ms. Pontbriand said. From 2012 to the present, Templeton has seen three treasurers and three accountants. Ms. Pontbriand said there usually isn’t this much turnover. She and Mr. Brown are in the process of reconciling the deposits with the cash book, which should have been done three years ago. But Ms. Pontbriand is happy with the way things are going now. “I’m extremely grateful for the assistance that Abrahams Group is providing,” she said. “It’s taking him every day in the month of December just to do the cash book for fiscal 2013.” Treasurer/Collector Kate Myers, who was the senior legal administrative assistant in the Board of Selectmen’s Office at the time, said it’s going more smoothly since Mr. Markel hired employees who know how to do the job and who are staying long-term. “When you have a financial team that’s there and working, it all comes together, “ Ms. Myers said.