Excellence in Financial Reporting - KXNet - Bismarck/Minot/Williston/Dickinson

Excellence in Financial Reporting

For the 33rd year running, the city of Minot has been awarded the Certificate of Achievement for Excellence in Financial Reporting.

The Government Finance Officers Association evaluates the city's Comprehensive Annual Financial Report or the CAFR for understandability and readability.
The Certificate of Achievement is the highest form of recognition in the area of governmental accounting and financial reporting.
Finance Director Cindy Hemphill credits her staff and she says in the first of her six-and-a-half years as director, it was a lot of pressure to ensure Minot continued receiving the award.
She says 33 years of recognition for Minot is a testament to the system's efficiency.

(Cindy Hemphill, Minot City Finance Director) "As the city grows and as our budget grows it becomes more and more difficult to be sure that we have every 'i' dotted and every 't' crossed, making sure our numbers do match."

(Cindy Hemphill, Minot City Finance Director) "There are certain audit standards that we have to adhere to. OMB-Circular-133 for the accounting geeks out there, they'll know what that is. The more money that we have, we have to make sure that everything is accounted for properly. The independent auditors really look at that closely."

Hemphill says the CAFR is a time consuming process --- compiled from January to April.