Iowa City school district to order audit

IOWA CITY - The Iowa City school district will hire an outside auditor to look at its operational processes after it recently discovered $2 million in bookkeeping errors, the district announced Friday night.

The mistakes did not cost the district any money. Rather, the money was personnel expenses counted twice.

Still, it's a significant amount, and it came after a passionate debate last spring in which 22 teacher positions were nearly cut because of money woes.

“April would have been a much better month if this had not happened,” Superintendent Stephen Murley said Friday night

Two errors led to the budget screwup.

One was when $1.418 million in personnel money from a federal education jobs program was placed under both the federal program and the district's personnel expenses in the budget, Murley said. The teachers were identified by numbers, not by name, so the mistake was not immediately apparent, he said.

Also, $564,000 in state money meant to boost teachers' salaries that was not planned as an expenditure was double counted, Murley said.

No one was paid twice, Murley said.

The district has projected budget shortfalls in the coming years, so this $2 million means the reductions will be less than expected, he said.

Last April, district administrators wanted to cut 22 regular-education teacher positions to save $1.4 million to put toward the deficit. After public outcry and even a student-made documentary opposing the cuts, the school board voted to instead use the district's reserves to make up the difference and save the jobs.

The bookkeeping errors were caught as the district's business office closed out the books from the fiscal year that ended June 30, the district said in a news release.

Murley would not say if anyone was disciplined, calling it a personnel issue.

There is not yet a timeline for completing the audit. Murley said he has looked at three vendors with expertise in educational operations.

The cost will depend on the scope of the audit. Murley said it will at least look at the business, human resources and technology offices, saying those were “all linked in terms of the errors that occurred.”