By: CRAIG SHULTZ – Press Enterprise October 17, 2013| Original Article at PE.com
Beaumont City Manager Alan Kapanicas said he does not know why the city was sent a letter from the state controller saying that it had failed to file financial and accounting reports required under state law.
“We are trying to get to the bottom of this. We thought we were alright before and this is the first we heard of it,” Kapanicas wrote in an email on Wednesday, Oct. 16.
Earlier that day, state Controller John Chiang had sent letters to 126 local government agencies that have failed to file the required reports, a news release from his office states.
Beaumont was one of nine cities on the list, and the only one in the Inland area.
The rest on the letters went to special districts, including the Inland Library System in San Bernardino and Jurupa Community Service District in Riverside.
California has 58 counties, 482 cities and 4,719 special districts, the majority of which complied with the law.
The agencies were given until Dec. 31 to file the documents.
“Transparency in financial reporting – including public salaries – is necessary to protect communities against the misuse of taxpayer dollars and other abuses of public trust,” Chiang said in the news release.
Under state law, local governments are required to file reports of financial transactions with the controller’s office, including figures on revenues, expenditures and long-term debt, within 110 days of the end of the fiscal year.
Each report noted in the letter is more than a year overdue, the release states.
Agencies were told to file the delinquent reports by the deadline or be subject to an audit.
Beaumont City Council members voted to accept an audit of the city’s books for fiscal year 2011-12 at their meeting on Tuesday, Oct. 15.