REPORT DIGEST

REGIONAL OFFICE OF EDUCATION #11: CLARK,
COLES, CUMBERLAND, DOUGLAS, EDGAR, MOULTRIE,
AND SHELBY COUNTIES

FINANCIAL AUDIT
FOR THE TWO YEARS ENDED JUNE 30, 2024

Release Date:  April 30, 2025

FINDINGS THIS AUDIT: 1

CATEGORY:  NEW -- REPEAT – TOTAL
Category 1:  1 -- 0 -- 1
Category 2:  0 -- 0 -- 0
Category 3:  0 -- 0 -- 0
TOTAL:  1 -- 0 -- 1

FINDINGS LAST AUDIT: 0

State of Illinois, Office of the Auditor
General
FRANK J. MAUTINO, AUDITOR GENERAL

To obtain a copy of the Report contact:
Office of the Auditor General, 400 West
Monroe, Suite 306, Springfield, IL
62704-9849
(217) 782-6046 or TTY (888) 261-2887

This Report Digest and Full Report are also
available on the worldwide web at
www.auditor.illinois.gov

SYNOPSIS

• (24-1) The Regional Office of Education
#11 did not have sufficient internal
controls over the financial reporting
process.

FINDINGS, CONCLUSIONS, AND RECOMMENDATIONS

CONTROLS OVER FINANCIAL STATEMENT
PREPARATION

The Regional Office of Education #11 (ROE)
did not have sufficient internal controls
over the financial reporting process. While
the ROE maintains controls over the
processing of most accounting transactions,
there are not sufficient controls over the
preparation of the cash basis financial
statements for management or employees in
the normal course of performing their
assigned functions to prevent or detect
financial statement misstatements and
disclosure errors and omissions in a timely
manner.

The School Code 105 ILCS 5/2-3.17a allows a
Regional Office of Education or Educational
Service Center to utilize a cash basis,
modified cash basis, or generally accepted
accounting principles (GAAP) basis of
accounting to prepare financial statements
for audit. The ROE has chosen to utilize the
modified cash basis of accounting for
financial statement reporting. The ROE is
required to maintain a system of controls
over the preparation of financial statements
in accordance with its selected basis of
accounting.

A negative balance in a pooled cash account
is a borrowing of other funds’ cash and,
therefore, should be reported as an amount
due to another fund. During review of the
ROE’s accounting records, auditors noted the
ROE was reporting negative cash of $76,055
in the ROE’s pooled cash account for the
Institute Fund. There was sufficient cash in
other bank accounts to offset this negative
amount, so the Institute Fund was still
reporting a positive cash balance. However,
the cash amount was understated by reporting
the negative pooled amount as a reduction of
cash rather than an amount due to the
General Fund. The General Fund’s cash
account was overstated, and the amount due
from the Institute Fund was not reported.

Regional Office of Education #11 management
indicated that this was an oversight that
the ROE did not realize was being made until
alerted to it on January 16, 2025. It
appears as though the ROE was incorrectly
borrowing for a few years but just learned
of it, due to the higher than usual amount.
(Finding 24-001, pages 10A-10B)

The auditors recommended that as part of
internal control over the preparation of
financial statements, the ROE should review
individual funds’ cash balances in the
pooled cash account to ensure that each
fund’s cash balance in the pooled cash
account is reported properly.

ROE Response:  The ROE #11 will review
individual funds’ cash balances in the
pooled cash account to ensure that each
fund’s cash balance in the pooled cash
account is reported properly. We have made
some recent personnel changes that will help
us better monitor this process, improve
internal controls, and prevent the error
from reoccurring.

AUDITORS’ OPINION

Our auditors state the Regional Office of
Education #11 financial statements as of
June 30, 2024 are fairly presented in all
material respects.

This financial audit was conducted by the
firm of West & Company, LLC.

JOE BUTCHER
Division Director

This report is transmitted in accordance
with Section 3-14 of the Illinois State
Auditing Act.

FRANK J. MAUTINO
Auditor General

FJM:JMM