Council accepts annual financial report; finance director outlines options to close $24M draft budget gap

The Reno City Council accepted the city’s annual comprehensive financial report (ACFR) Dec. 10 after auditors from Baker Tilly presented the audit results. Auditors reported an unmodified (clean) opinion on the city’s financial statements and said they had no reportable internal‑control findings. The single‑audit report for federal grants remained pending because the federal compliance supplement was delayed; auditors said testing was substantially complete and that they would issue the single‑audit reports once federal guidance arrived.

Finance Director Vicky Van Buren briefed council on the draft FY27 general fund outlook and a working projected deficit of about $24 million under current assumptions. Van Buren outlined possible corrective measures including budgeting an estimated vacancy‑savings rate (1.5–2.0 percent) to capture recurring savings within the fiscal year; a citywide zero‑based review to require departments to justify all spending requests (estimated to yield roughly $2 million in savings at this stage); and the temporary use of one‑time capital or project closeout funds for recurring maintenance costs (staff warned these are short‑term fixes).

Council instructed staff to develop the FY27 budget informed by council feedback and directed follow‑up work on revenue trends, vacancy lists, and detailed options. Staff said more revenue trend data (notably consolidated tax allocations) will be available in January to refine projections and that they will return with updated scenarios before final budget adoption.