Auditor reports St. James in good financial shape
CONVENT — St. James Parish government was in good financial shape in 2011, an accountant for the parish told the Parish Council.
“This is a good financial report,” Postlethwaite & Netterville CPA Michael L. LeBlanc said Wednesday of the analysis of the parish’s financial statements for the year ending Dec. 31, 2011.
“You take fiscal responsibility very seriously in this parish and you have since I’ve been involved here,” LeBlanc said. “That doesn’t appear likely to change even with some new faces here.”
No significant audit adjustments were made, he said.
LeBlanc said parish government revenue exceeded expenditures by $103.4 million.
LeBlanc called that a “good, good, healthy, solid fund balance,” and said the balance had increased by $8.1 million from $95.3 million in 2010.
That increase is partly due to a 3.4 increase in property tax revenue from the previous year and a $1.7 million increase in revenue from the parish’s Gas and Water Distribution System Fund and the St. James Parish Youth Detention Center, LeBlanc said.
In other council business:
Presidential veto: Parish President Timmy Roussel vetoed a June resolution appointing Gramercy resident Dennis Roussel to serve on the District 2 recreation board.
Dennis Roussel is ineligible to serve because state law requires former public employees to wait two years before serving or being appointed to a paid or unpaid board or commission position, according
to the parish president’s written veto message.
Parish spokeswoman Melissa Wilkins said Roussel, who had worked for the parish for 19 years, retired in May as administrator of the parish recreation department.
Mosquito testing: Timmy Roussel said that over the past month, five mosquitoes in the parish have tested positive for West Nile virus.
Parish officials are holding off spraying larvicide until
the rain stops for two consecutive days in order to keep the larvicide from washing away, said Eric Deroche, parish director of emergency preparedness.