Harriman revamps its financial record keeping

HARRIMAN — The Village of Harriman has made sweeping changes to its financial record keeping, water billing and tax collections in response to a state audit. No money was missing and there no financial irregularities, Mayor Steve Welle said. But the State Comptroller’s audit did find numerous procedures were not being correctly done. “Subsequently,” he said, “we changed a number of procedures.” He added, the village has also contracted a new computer system and software to conform to what the State Comptroller wants. The improvements come in response to an in-depth review of the accounting and bookkeeping practices conducted by the comptroller’s office following a request by the Village Board. “Unfortunately,” Welle said, “our former auditor, based in Buffalo, didn’t advise us of things they should have and of procedures that were not followed correctly.” The village has since replaced its DOS-based financial software with programs by KV.S Information Systems, Inc. It also has hired Sedore & Co. of Poughkeepsie as its new auditing firm. The cost of the new hardware and software will not result in any increase to village taxpayers. The mayor said the expense was covered by appropriations in the current year’s budget. - Claudia Wysocki