Auditor: Alleghany in good financial shape this year

The annual audit report by Bryan Starnes of Martin, Starnes and Associates of Hickory shows that the county has good financial footing. The firm, which has checked over the county's finances for three years, is contracted by the commission to perform the annual audit.

According to the auditor, the county had an unreserved fund balance of $2,356,285 as of June 30 of this year, a figure which shows an increase of $96,346 over last year's balance.

Starnes said the county's fund balance represents 26 percent of the total budget, or about a three month supply of funding. He explained that the funding reserve was "no where near excessive and not dangerously low," going on to explain that smaller counties need larger fund balances than larger counties because their budgets are dealing with smaller numbers. "To end the year with a $96,000 increase in fund balance is admirable," said Starnes.

In offering a comparison of the past four years' balances, he showed that the county had about $2.5 million in reserve in 1999 and about $3 million in reserve in 2000. That amount fell to $2.84 million in 2001 and rose to the current total of about $2.94 million this year.

Starnes noted that the county has property values of $677,994,262 and receives about 55 percent of its income from ad valorum (property) taxes.

The economic slowdown and decreases in state reimbursements have led to budget losses outside the county's control, Starnes said. The state reimbursements, including $61,880 from inventory reimbursements, $30,000 from beer and wine tax reimbursements and $20,000 in withheld homestead reimbursements all directly impacted the current budget.

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