City auditors from a regional accounting firm presented the City of Eustis's annual audit for the fiscal year and highlighted several management-letter items the commission should address.

Helen Painter, audit partner, and Lauren Walker, audit manager, told the commission the audit team designed procedures to detect material misstatements and issued an opinion on the financial statements. Painter thanked staff including the finance director and assistant finance director for assisting during the audit.

The auditors identified two management-letter comments: (1) accounting records for the police pension fund were repeatedly late due to an outsourced CPA whose retirement had disrupted timeliness; auditors recommended deciding how to handle that accounting going forward, and (2) the city's capital-asset records need more timely reconciliation, a frequent local-government challenge amplified by recent ARPA-funded capital projects. Painter said reconciling those records took multiple iterations.

Auditors also told commissioners the building fund had accumulated excess revenues over expenditures and that Florida statute limits how much excess a building fund may retain; the firm recommended a plan to spend down or appropriately allocate those balances. Separately, auditors noted the CRA has a note due this year that is a balloon payment and will require refinancing; the auditors flagged that interest-rate conditions are less favorable than five years ago and the city will need to make a refinancing decision this year.

Painter closed by saying all funds ended the year solvent with reserves and that pension plans performed well in the market.

Ending: Commissioners had no further questions at the presentation; staff will follow up on the auditor's management-letter recommendations on pension accounting, capital-asset reconciliations, building fund balances and CRA refinancing preparations.