The town has mostly cut its ties with its financial consultant, FJ Basile CPAs, PC, after it paid the business almost four times what it planned to.
Supervisor Earle Reed told the O-D that he expected to pay the company an annual salary of $40,000 when it was hired in September 2007. Since then, the town has paid $147,957, according to town records.
The firm is run by president and certified public accountant Frank Basile.
Basile said his firm worked 1,200 hours in 2008 for the town. He said it is common that a deal for professional services exceeds the client’s original budget estimates.
“Our contract did not stipulate an annual cost for professional services, but only an hourly rate based upon the level of the professional providing the service,” he said.
“In lieu of the town employing a comptroller, our firm also performed many functions in that capacity” for the town.
The town’s contract ran out Dec. 31, 2008, and though the firm has continued to do some work for the town, officials have decided not to enter into a new contract.
“Frank did an extraordinary amount of work last year,” Reed said. “But we’re not going to need him much this year at all.”
Since it was hired, Basile’s firm has helped bookkeeper Carol Fairbrother build the town’s annual budget and update its accounting processes. Basile made $150 per hour for his service while his associates made $80 per hour, according to board minutes.
In Basile’s place, Board Member Christine Krupa will help Fairbrother manage the budget and keep on eye on spending during the year.
“It’s less of a cost to the taxpayers to have me do it rather than have an outside consultant,” Krupa said. “The task for which (Basile) was hired was completed and we’re going forward. If we need him in the future I’m sure he’d be able to work with us.”
Krupa, elected in 2007 to fill the seat of late Town Board member J.C. Waszkiewicz, is also a lawyer and a certified public accountant.
Reed said that Basile might still be brought in on occasion but that any work he does in the future must be approved by the board.
According to an e-mail from Basile, his firm was hired to correct financial deficiencies pointed out in 2006 audited financial statements from the town’s independent auditor.
The “adverse” opinion offered in those statements would have had a negative effect on the town’s credit rating, Basile said in the e-mail.
Since it was hired, the firm has helped implement federal accounting standards, prepared the 2008 and 2009 budgets, coordinated bonding and other financing measures, evaluated internal controls, updated town financial accounting software and performed other duties, Basile said.
“Much of the work that has been performed by our firm should enable the town to eliminate the adverse opinion on the financial statements as previously mentioned above,” Basile said in the e-mail.
“It should be noted that the town continues to maintain an “A” rating from Standard & Poor’s.”
