Ohio Auditor Dave Yost was proud of the city of Delaware’s 2015 audit, according to Councilman Joe DiGenova, 3rd Ward.

“He sent me an email saying he was really proud of the city of Delaware and the audit and it how came out,” he said during a Finance Committee meeting Tuesday.

The 2015 audit conducted by Newark-based Wilson, Shannon & Snow Inc. determined there were no material weaknesses or deficiencies at the financial statement level or for handling dollars from major federal programs.

“I know it’s your job to make sure we do our job,” DiGenova said to firm representative, Jason Carr, who has worked with the city for the past 15 years.

“Audits are not always fun,” Carr said.

But he said Delaware city staff are professional, helpful to provide information and serve the “underlying principle to do the right thing.”

The accounting firm did submit a management letter, a public record not included with the 2015 audit, with recommendations for improvement.

The firm first recommended that all orders or contracts involving expenditures of money be timely certified.

It then noted that the city identified a federal reimbursement of $83,221 was inadvertently recorded in the Capital Improvement Fund instead of the State Highway Fund, which incurred the costs subject to reimbursement.

“It was more of how we posted the receipt,” Finance Director Dean Stelzer said.

Third on the list was the firm’s recommendation for the city to formalize and adopt policies for program requirements related to federal dollars received and spent, specific to each source of federal funding.

And finally, it recommended that the city reconcile its water customer deposits on a monthly basis and ensure proper cash balance reported within financial statements. The recommendation comes after the firm determined a variance of $5,664.20 when reconciling deposits from utility department account ledgers to the city’s year-end financial statements.

The city requires a $50 deposit for customers opening their account for water.

Yost, a former Delaware County Prosecutor and Auditor, and his office will handled the city’s audit for 2016. Stelzer said it’s part of the offices intent to do the audit one time for cities that relied on an external firm for 10 to 15 years.

In other business, City Manager Tom Homan said the city should review its impact fees.

Building a new home requires impact fees for city services and residential development pays the city $162 for police; $314 for fire; $366 for municipal and $1,226 for parks per house.

Stelzer said the revenue from the fees can only be used to increase the city’s capacity such as adding shelters to the parks because there are more residents.

The last review of fees was in 2006, Homan said.

Also, Councilman Chris Jones, 1st Ward, said the city will not foot the $400,000 construction bill for a memorial of Delaware native Rutherford B. Hayes, the 19th U.S. president, next to Amatos restaurant on the corner of William and Sandusky streets.

Dollars to build the memorial will be from fundraising, which is handled by the Rutherford B. Hayes Memorial Committee, which meets at Mingo Park 5:30 p.m. Thursday.