District survey complete
By ROBERT LINNEHAN
The Cherry Hill Sun
5/10/2008

KPMG submits transitional study; board of education, staff to review, issue response

The Cherry Hill School District released the final draft of a transitional study by Swiss-based KPMG, LLP, a global provider of financial advisory services.

The 161-page report can be found in its entirety at the Cherry Hill School District Web site, cherryhill.k12.nj.us.

While the administration has yet to release a full statement on the findings of the report, it has said that the final report will be used as a tool to guide district management in its business and human resources in the future.

Following a full review by school board members and the appropriate district staff, the administration will develop and release a full response to the report, which will serve as a map for addressing issues identified in the report, officials said.

It is worth noting that the report did not reveal any instances in the district of fraud, theft or misconduct, officials said.

Board of Education President Sharon Giaccio said the recommendations from the KPMG report would help the district plot a course to implement a financial management environment that reflects the best practices. She encouraged interested residents to read the report in its entirety, rather than taking excerpts of the report out of context.

“The board and administration are committed to implementing measures as recommended by KPMG and indicated by a reasonable response to identified risk. However, it should be noted that the administration still assesses its internal controls on a daily basis as it processes daily transactions,” she said. “If additional areas are identified as being in need, measures to strengthen controls are implemented even if those areas were not identified in the KPMG report.”

At this time, however, Giaccio said there is no current plan to proceed with a full forensic audit, primarily because of the significant cost to conduct such an audit in a district where the study didn’t indicate any instances of theft or fraud.

Commissioned by the board of education at a cost of up to $197,000, the study began in October 2007.

Initial results of the study released in early November revealed the district has antiquated or non-existent financial management and human resources systems and is currently understaffed in its human resources and business departments when compared with a similar sized district.

Other districts of comparable size in the same region as Cherry Hill have an average of about 25 full-time employees working in their human resource and business departments, Giaccio said when the initial results were released.

The Cherry Hill district averages about eight full-time employees less in those two departments than other districts.

The study also recommended acquiring new financial and human resources software to increase efficiency in the district.

The findings offered by KPMG in its report can’t be remedied by any short-term plan, Superintendent David Campbell said after the initial results. A multi-year plan will likely be needed to address many of the report’s suggestions, which he said would not come at the expense of academics in the district.

Campbell first discussed the need for a financial report during the spring of 2006 when he interviewed for the vacant superintendent position. At that time, it was clear that Assistant Superintendent Tom Redmond and Budget Coordinator Conni Spiegle would retire within the year, which intensified the need for a transitional financial study, he said.

With a new financial team of Assistant Superintendent Lisa Palmer and District Budget Coordinator Marilu Devone brought into the district in the summer of 2007, Campbell felt it was the correct time to commission the study.