By Rebecca Dopp
Times-News Correspondent
The Central Utah Counseling Center is in good financial shape according to Farrel Marx, representative, as he presented the financial audit, prepared by Kimball and Roberts Accounting firm to county commissioners. He said they hadn’t received much criticism over the past few years, but this year there were some findings.
“We have a very safe system,” Marx said. “For example, we contract with Six County Association of Governments to do our general ledger, payables and payroll. We prepare the stuff, but we tell them what checks to cut. There are two entities looking over this all the time. We could save money and do it in-house, but we want you to feel comfortable that we are trying to do a good job and things are getting looked at appropriately.”
Marx said that their agency was a little odd, being multi-county. He said most of their funding came from the state. He said if you are a state agency, then at the end of the year, you go on a spending spree with any leftover money or lose it. The CUCC can carry money over. He said the state doesn’t like that, but that was how the state set it up so the CUCC would act like a business. He also said the state sets restrictions to make them act like a government. Unlike private businesses who would take the leftover money to pay out their shareholders, Marx said they pile the leftover money into future services.
The CUCC has $2.6 million in net assests, Marx said.
“If we were to ever fold up shop,” he said, “some of these assets would become Juab County’s or be split up between the other counties.”
The CUCC covers Juab, Millard, Wayne, Sevier, Sanpete, and Piute Counties.
Last year in Mental Health, they lost $283,000. The fund balance at the beginning of the year was $1.8 and it dropped to $1.6. They use that balance for operating expenses and contingencies.
“We never know how many people are going to be hospitalized. Hospitalizations cost about $1,000 a day, so if you have a bad year, you could easily spend $150,000 more than last year and then the next year you might get back to where you were,” he said. “We keep a contingency fund and keep enough funds for operating capital.”
If the CUCC can’t come up with the funds, then the county would have to foot the bill.
In the substance abuse department, they came out $17,000 in the black.
In the management letter, there were several findings. The first one dealt with a budget adjustment that was not made and they overextended the budget by $329,000.
The second finding said that deposits in some of the satellite offices were not being made within the state required three days. Some of those offices were not open everyday and sometimes did not have a second party to make the deposit.
The third finding was found when a patient was billed as a Medicaid patient and they had lost their eligibility.
The last finding was problematic for the CUCC because a former director had used a Center credit card to pay for a down payment on a new car. He paid that money back quickly, but the board and the attorneys felt that this person should be sanctioned and in fact does not work for the agency anymore.
Commissioner LuWayne Walker asked about the bid process for the new building in Nephi. Brian Whipple, CUCC respresentative, said they needed to get the bids open and approved in order to close on the CIB loan. He said they are waiting on the architects to get the papers together. He was optimistic to meet the deadline, though, and thought they would get started building within the next few months.
Marx also discussed the state budget cuts for the 2009-2010 fiscal year for mental health and substance abuse centers. He said they are permanent cuts to the budget, but have been backfilled.
“The bottom line of what we are facing,” said Whipple, “at the end of fiscal year 2010, we’ll be falling off a cliff at the start of fiscal year 2011 if they [the state] doesn’t backfill or the economy doesn’t turn around.”
He said some cuts had already been made last fall and the system had absorbed almost $5 million in cuts. He said $13 million by the start of 2011 would be cut and they would not have enough Medicaid match funds and also lose state funds.
“We’re hoping the economy changes by then,” Whipple said. “We’re hoping the legislature will look at backfilling like they’ve done and there won’t be a lot of devastation to the system. It could potentially mean more layoffs.”
He said this year they were conservative and encouraged early retirement and did not fill some vacant positions. He said they were saving money and depending on the eligibles this year, they wanted to build their reserve funds with any leftover monies to offset what could happen in 2011.
