All right. Welcome to the regular meeting of the audit committee for December 8th, 2025.

I'm Jay Singleton, and I'm the vice chair of this committee. I want to offer a friendly reminder to

all members, staff, and the public that these meetings are broadcast live to enable greater

public participation. These broadcasts include real-time captioning as a further method to

increase the accessibility of our proceedings to the community.

Therefore, all speakers need to be mindful of the rate of their speech so that our captioners

can fully capture and transcribe all comments for the broadcast.

We ask all speakers to moderate the speed and clarity of their comments.

At this time, I'll ask the clerk to call the roll so that we can verify a quorum for this

meeting.

Abeni.

Here.

Committee Member Chugtai.

Present.

Chugtai. Present. Hosbeen. Present. Omar is absent. Williams. Present. Vice

Chair Singleton. Present. Chair Payne. Present. There are six members present.

Let the record reflect that we have a quorum and I will now pass it over to

to chair pain I think you vice chair singleton colleagues our agendas before

us may have a motion to adopt the agenda is there a second second all those in

favor say aye opposed say nay that carries and the agenda is adopted next

we have the acceptance of minutes from our October 20th 2025 meeting may I have

that motion. So moved. Second. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed say nay. The ayes have it and the October 20th minutes are accepted. We have five items in new business today. We'll begin with item three which is an update report from the police department on actions related to recommendations from the 2024 MPD fleet management audit. I will now invite commander Justin Royster for administrative services division to give

that presentation. Chair Payne and committee, I'm going to introduce all of

our MPD guests this morning. We've got Deputy Chief Olsen as well as Commander

Reisdorfer and Commander Lewis and I also want to thank them for the work that

they've put in to provide these updates for you today. I know it's been a lot to

pull some of these numbers together so I do appreciate it and we'll start off

with DC Olson welcome

okay so the fleet management audit the objective of this was to review the

process and controls around fleet management at the Minneapolis Police

department including squad cars to ensure sufficient and operating effectively so

I'm going to discuss issue 1 and 8 so it's that vehicle accident investigations

there are delays and investigating vehicle accidents involving MPD

employees leading to a backlog of cases so this is our policy or MPD policy and

procedure is 4411. The Accident Review Committee shall make a preliminary

review of all accidents. Upon finding an accident preventable, the Accident Review

Committee shall forward the case to the Internal Affairs Unit. After approval of

the recommended finding, the IAU will determine if any MPD policy procedure

was violated and if so, an IAU investigation will be conducted. So the

The accident review committee as listed in policy is a traffic unit commander or designee,

a sworn employee trained in accident reconstruction.

The current best practice for MPD accident review committee utilizes the following.

A traffic investigator trained in crash reconstruction assigned to the case, traffic unit investigator

trained in crash reconstruction for peer review of a case, traffic unit lieutenant as chair

of the Accident Review Committee and final determiner of facts.

So some of our barriers, human resources.

So in 2020, we had several people leave,

and then we had a sergeant that was promoted to lieutenant,

and then we lost one of our sergeants.

And the training is really intensive.

It takes three or four years to train

as a traffic reconstructionist.

So we had to take the time to get somebody trained up.

Other cases taking precedence, so they

don't just do those cases.

They also do fatals.

They do criminal vehicular operations.

So in order to have that experienced staff, we just needed time to get them trained up.

So current staff, MPD administration, myself, has been notified of needed positions.

We trained those new employees for succession.

Support staff assigned, so we did get somebody in the traffic unit to help with some of that support staff.

there's a lot of paperwork that's involved in calling community members back when they have an issue to include hit and runs.

We assigned a CSO to help with daily tasks and assigned a second investigator who has recently completed their reconstructionist training.

Well, that turned out really small.

Sorry.

I should have worn my glasses.

So these are some of the numbers.

We are at 100% cases closed for 2019 and 2020.

The numbers are small for 21 and 22.

The reason is that we decided to not go back at this time.

We will go back.

But a lot of those cases that aren't closed are from cases where employees have left

and the damage is minor and doesn't involve another person.

So then we decided to prioritize the cases from 23, 24, 25.

We are at 62% in 2025, 47% in 2023, and then 53% in 2024.

And then for risk eight, it's very brief.

The risk management alignment.

There are opportunities between MPD and risk management for alignment and coordination in the vehicle accident process.

So now risk management receives an email notification whenever there is an MPD squad accident.

And our next step is we're working with the city enterprise to align policy with overall city policy.

So our policy was not the same as the city policy.

So we're working to make that so that they are more similar, so that we're not in competition with one another.

And that's all for me.

So if you have questions, we are not going to stay for the rest of it because it's not my department.

Did you have questions for me?

Member Williams.

Just a quick question involving the percentages of closure.

How do you, I think you alluded to this, but how do you prioritize which cases you take?

Is it chronological?

Is it more by severity?

Just maybe talk me through that process.

Yep, they do do it by severity first.

And then the priority would be if somebody was injured in the accident, obviously that

would take precedence.

And if there are multiple policy violations, and if there's more than one preventable accident

that occurred by an employee, that would also take precedence.

Thank you.

Member Hosbean.

Thank you, Chair Payne.

And thank you, D.C. Olson.

We appreciate this overview.

And I just, so I'm hearing three, sorry, 363 open.

You alluded earlier that not all involve another person.

And I think one of the questions back in December of 2024 was around how many community members were impacted.

and that leading to insurance claims and other types of potential delay on their end.

Do you know of the 363, how many involved community member, either property or persons?

I don't.

I do know that we have added that as a part of now our data gathering for 2025.

We added that to the form if a community member was involved.

So a community member involvement, although it's difficult to quantify that, but even if we strike a vehicle that's unoccupied, nobody's injured, but it's their vehicle, we do consider that community involvement.

So we are tracking that now.

Perfect.

And that includes, like, they would need to have an insurance claim for that vehicle, right?

Yes.

Okay.

Yes.

Perfect.

And then, um, just a quick clarifying question.

So the one, the number that go to internal affairs is not captured here.

That's a separate number.

These are the ones that are open with your division.

Correct.

All right.

Thank you so much.

Uh, I just had a question.

How many crash investigators did we have in 2019?

Five.

Five.

And where are we at right now?

Four.

Four.

And then just out of curiosity, are we doing any focus?

I think you had a mention of succession in terms of it being a three-year lead time to get somebody trained up.

Do we have people kind of in the pipeline continuously, or do we try to keep a steady state,

and then we will go through that three-year training process once an opening happens?

We have one more that we are looking to that we're putting through the process now.

Okay. Thank you.

Not seeing any more questions. Thank you so much for the presentation.

Thank you.

And we will welcome up our next presenter.

Good morning, I'm Commander, can you hear me okay?

Yep. I'm Commander Reisdorfer, I oversee the Administrative Service Division, which

the issues that we'll talk about right now fall into that.

Okay, here we go.

So out of this we've had several issues to cover today.

The first one is the fleet policies and procedures.

As you'll see in here, the policy sides, we have that in progress right now, whereas

the procedures were in that remediate phase, which after Travis Cam was nice enough to

kind of help me through this, we're working towards the compliance side where we just

have to submit those supporting documents.

We are running into an obstacle within the policy side because we have a limited number

of policymakers and the vast majority of those are tasked right now within the settlement

consent decree.

And so they're very overworked right now with what we have.

And so our hope is that second to third quarter of 2026 we would be able to amend those policies

and then by quarter four we would be able to get that to the command staff for review

and consideration.

with issue three of the GPS and vehicle tracking.

The GPS tracking and monitoring,

all of our MARC squad cars are monitored

through the CAD system.

That enhances our safety, the dispatch efficiency,

and the accountability.

It also supports the review, investigation,

and compliance section of this.

In addition to that, it helps us with our inventory

and asset control because we see the vehicles

that are being built in the vehicle.

because we see the vehicles that are being moved

and they're being used, and we have meetings

not only with Fleet Services,

but we also have it within our own staff.

Ways that we've worked into that remediate phase

to get compliance, it sounds like we'll be able to say

that this one's checked off by the end of the year

once we supply those supporting documents,

is I have a weekly executive oversight meeting

with the chief and the executive staff

to go over the fleet needs, where we stand on

resource allocation, the status of different vehicles,

readiness and just kind of all those risk management signs that we would see in

addition to that we've also implemented a monthly fleet service review meeting

which is with fleet service and Chris Royston and his staff to kind of go over

where our numbers are right now if a vehicle is flagged because it's low

miles or something like that we just work through that to make sure it's being

highly utilized and nothing is sitting with the external fuel card okay

That's another one that we're in that remediate stage where we should be able to say that we achieve that by the end of the year as well.

The task that we did in that situation was working with the audit committee is we pulled back all of our external fuel cards with the exception of just five.

And those five are because they're in that immediate need area.

And we implemented a smart sheet to show the usage.

And then we also have a form in process now that we didn't have before for that request and then also the tracking.

and then my fleet manager, he does a monthly review to reconcile with our finance to make

sure any receipts submitted line up so that way there isn't any issues in that area.

Issue six right now is the additional oversight and activities.

That's an in progress section right now with the weekly executive staff oversight.

Each week again we meet to talk about our fleet issues.

In addition to that, we have the enhanced internal audits strengthened with the review

process to improve accountability and accuracy.

The weekly command meetings in addition to that, the division commander and deputy chief

meet weekly to review the fleet issues and operational needs.

And then we also have our monthly meeting, which I know some of this is repetitive, but

we meet monthly once again to talk about these oversight issues.

The reason why this one isn't in remediate is one of the things that we're implementing

is through ServiceNow integration to make it easier for our officers and others to report

maintenance issues versus the current process we have.

It's a bit outdated.

And so we're expected to go live with that in January 2026.

So we just thought until that's live and functional, we wouldn't push for the remediate.

Within the mileage entry, we're in that remediate stage once again.

We support it.

As you can see, we've taken significant steps to effectively address and manage this issue.

We sent out that department-wide email to address it.

Then we also have a weekly and monthly meeting with myself and the deputy chief, along with

fleet management, to address anything where the mileage may have been entered in wrong

when they were getting fuel.

That goes to the supervisor to make sure that they understand that this happened, and we

can work through that process.

There is one thing that I will add at the very end is, you know, we've been working

really well with fleet services.

with aspects on how we do our fuel,

but it's an outdated system,

and unfortunately it's not something that NPD controls,

and there just really isn't a good solution right now

to work us a way where it's a better requirement

or to flag like, you know,

on one day you entered 701 in miles

and now you're entering 9999.

Like, there's just no way for us to flag that

besides the follow-up that we're doing now.

So, issue 10, this is the other one that's going to be in progress.

It's the NPD Fleet Management Program.

Right now we're working in a legacy database and that assessment was completed.

And so a lot of our work is actually moving into ServiceNow because it's an enterprise-wide

system and it's already in use and it's cost-effective for the NPD.

In addition to that, we're working with the integration planning, which is underway to

make a smooth transition from the legacy system into the new system.

In addition to that, the modernized platform and upgrades are under review.

Some of those things include the new systems that Fleet Services is trying to look at to

update their systems, so that way ServiceNow will effectively, you know, interlock with

each other.

And that concludes my section.

Do you have any questions for me?

Any questions for members?

Member Hosman.

Thank you, Chair Payne.

Just a quick question in terms of implementation and training.

Do you feel like you have the resources?

This feels like a lot of change to what someone did yesterday versus January 2026.

Is there buy-in and training available that you feel to get folks to this new process?

Yes.

The one thing that I will say is it's been actually received very well when we reached

out to patrol and also supervisors about like the reporting process for how we're

going to do things differently because before it was on paper and having

something that's on your phone that you can just do or just go on to your MDC

and be able to do it right there it just makes it easier for them and that's

kind of what we're focused on right now so we do have that buy-in.

Perfect thank you for that insight.

Not seeing any other questions thank you so much for being here.

Thank you.

Next we will welcome up Commander Lewis.

Good morning.

Good morning.

I'm Renee Lewis, Commander of the Inspections Unit, and I'm going to be talking briefly about, I'll start with Issue 4, which is the Driver's License Program.

driver's license program. We completed that program a couple of months ago

where we had I would say 100% compliance with all drivers meeting

qualifications. The next section I'm going to be speaking about...

I don't know.

I might want to try this.

All right.

It's not here.

It's over.

You were talking about the other one?

Yeah, it was a good one.

Is that a different one?

Yeah.

Oh, yeah.

There you go.

Okay.

So off-duty work audit, some updates for you.

So we're just going to jump right into things that we've been doing the last couple years and months.

So I'm going to talk about some measures that were taken regarding the findings from the audit.

One of the things that we have done is we have established what we call a POD entry into workforce director.

which requires officers to enter all off-duty assignments into workforce under POD, which is our time code.

These entries are currently being used to verify hours worked at off-duty jobs throughout the city of Minneapolis.

Squad usage.

Squad usage must be approved prior to the beginning of the officer's shift.

request is made to an on-duty supervisor working at the precinct or the unit supervisor where the squad is located.

Once approved, officers complete the squad sign-out smart sheet,

and the information included is things like officer's name, their location,

the name of the site, the P number for the squad, etc.

Supervisor compliance checks.

All street supervisors, including lieutenants, are required to visit at least one site, one

off duty job site during their shift.

Requirement of supervisors to complete a compliance check smart sheet.

Once again, they're entering information regarding that site and the officer working

that site.

Some things that they include in the smart sheet is officer name, the date, location,

the squad number, call sign, whether or not the officer is approved to work at that off-duty

site.

Off-duty site coordinator.

They are required to send a monthly schedule for each officer working at the site that

they are responsible for.

And this information is used as a way to verify what the officers are putting into a workforce

director under their POD time entries.

Something new that we are working on is an off-duty scheduling app.

And this power app was created to replace the email system that we currently use to

receive the schedules.

The app should help, I believe it will help supervisors with their daily compliance checks

by giving them knowledge of off-duty jobs being worked in their precinct during their

shift.

The app will also collect data including name of business, location, officer name, officer

rank and the precinct that the job is located in.

And the app will also help with tracking the number of off-duty hours officers are working

on a weekly basis.

However, Workforce Director will continue to be the system of record for officers' POD

hours, as this is information that the officers are entering themselves.

Some current and future projects that the inspections unit is working on is creating

an all-encompassing audit program that will monitor all regular, overtime, and off-duty

hours worked by officers.

Acquiring new technology that can help with overall system integration and improve functionality.

This technology would help with analyzing, reviewing, and tracking officers' off-duty

hours worked.

And what I'm referring to would be the new payroll system, UKG, and something along the

lines of roll call, which uses GPS for real-time location tracking of officers in the field.

So that concludes my presentation.

Thank you.

Thank you for the presentation.

Any questions from members?

If you could go back a slide, and maybe one more.

For the power app, for what you're tracking, is it common that the precinct that the shift

is happening in would be covered by an officer within that precinct, or is it going to be

fairly common that the precinct's home, the officer's home base is a different precinct

than the business?

That is correct.

Okay.

Because it looks like there might be an opportunity to also capture that, because it looks like

we're getting the rank of the officer of the precinct

where the business is located,

but I didn't see the precinct where the officer

is based out of.

Is that something that we can connect

with our current systems?

Chair Payne, at this time, I don't have an answer for that,

but that is something that we can definitely look into.

Okay.

Any other questions from members?

Member Hosbean.

Thank you Chair Payne.

Just a quick question.

Issue seven, are we going back to that?

Or did we cover that?

That was the update of the fleet audit.

Oh, I'm sorry, the previous.

Yes, Chair Payne, Committee Member Hosni,

yeah, Deputy Chief Montgomery wasn't able to be here

for that update on that one.

Okay, perfect.

Apologies, we just skipped between the two,

so I appreciate you doing both of them.

No further questions.

Thank you for the presentation.

Thank you.

Seeing no further questions or comments

from committee members, I'll direct the clerk

to receive and file that report.

Next item five is the 2024 State of Minnesota

Office of the State Auditor Management

and Compliance Reports.

I invite Karen Stackin, Audit Director

from the Office of the State Auditor

to give this presentation.

Thank you, Audit Chair.

We also have Rob Lang, Deputy Controller, and George Hargrove, the city's controller, on hand.

So if you have questions specific to Minneapolis's response, they are here to answer those questions as well.

But Karen, thanks so much for being here.

Good morning, Chair Payne and members of the Audit Committee.

My name is Karen Stackin. I'm with the State Auditor's Office.

and I'm here to present the results of your 2024 audits.

First, I wanna thank management and staff

of the City of Minneapolis,

the Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board,

and the Municipal Building Commission

for their cooperation and assistance during our audits.

We audited the City of Minneapolis,

the Municipal Building Commission,

the Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board

for the year ended December 31st, 2024.

We issued our opinion on the city's

and the park board's financial statements

and issued management and compliance reports for the city, NBC, and the park board.

NBC does not have a separate opinion because it's included in the financial statements for the city.

We performed our audits in accordance with auditing standards generally accepted in the United States of America,

government auditing standards, and the uniform guidance.

And uniform guidance is the federal requirements for federal award programs.

Our opinions for both the park board and the city were dated June 25th, 2025.

Our opinions included in the respective entities audited financial statements.

Our opinions for the city and the park board were unmodified, which means that it's a clean opinion.

It's the best opinion that can be issued.

This means that the financial statements are fairly presented and conform with applicable accounting standards.

We also audited the City's and the Park Board's major federal award programs and have issued our opinion on compliance for major federal programs that we audited.

The opinion for each of the City's and the Park Board's major federal programs was also unmodified.

This means that the City and the Park Board have complied in all material respects with the compliance requirements that are direct and material to the major federal programs.

Throughout our audit, any findings related to internal control, compliance, Minnesota

legal compliance, federal program internal controls over compliance, or federal program

compliance were discussed with the respective management and staff.

At the end of the audits, we discussed the written findings, those would be the ones

that are included in the management and compliance report, in detail with the respective entity

with their respective members of management and governance.

Our management and compliance report for the city

includes a corrective action plan

and a summary schedule of prior audit findings,

both of which are provided by management.

There was no findings reported for the park board

in the current year,

and the MBC included only the summary schedule

of prior audit findings.

All right, the corrective action plan is management's plan

for resolving the current year findings

and is provided to us just before the report is issued.

We do not audit the information included

in the corrective action plan,

but we are required to follow up on it in the next audit.

The summary schedule of prior audit findings

lists the findings that were in the previous year's report

and then gives the follow-up for those.

And those will either show a status

of either fully corrected, partially corrected,

or not corrected.

So in our 2024 management and compliance report

the city, we reported four findings and were able to resolve three from the previous year.

Our schedule of findings in question costs includes findings about each finding.

It includes the criteria, that's the basis that we're measuring against, the condition,

which is a description of the issue, the context, which provides additional information or gives

more perspective, the effect, which is the condition that it has led to or could lead

to, the cause which is why the finding exists, and this was reviewed with finance management,

and then the recommendation is how we suggest to improve on each issue.

So of the four findings that I mentioned just a minute ago, two of them are related to internal

controls.

The first one was a prior period of adjustment, the second one related to service organization

controls and then the third and fourth related to federal award programs one was related to

suspension and debarment and the fourth one was related to sub recipient monitoring

the city has provided a corrective action plan and that is included in the financial report

and then as with all current year findings we will review them again at the next audit

and management will provide the current summary of prior audit findings and then in that prior

audit findings for the city we resolved three comments one was related to the

federal funding accountability and transparency act reporting the second one

was related to suspension and debarment and the by build America by America Act

and then the third one was related to activities allowed and unallowed so

those three were all related to federal award programs our 2024 management

compliance report for the park board had no findings. There was also no findings

from 2023 to follow up on. And for the MBC there was no current findings in 2024

and we had one finding that we followed up on that was resolved from 2023 and

that had related to a prior audit adjustment. Does anybody have any

questions? Any questions from members? Not seeing any. Okay thank you for your

time today. Thank you. Chair Payne, the controller and deputy controller would

just like to say a word if you don't mind them addressing you. Please. Thank you.

Welcome. Yeah thank you, thank you, thank you, Chair Payne, Audit Committee

members. My name is George Hargrove. I'm the city controller. Just wanted to, you know, just to say a few things. I mean, Rob and I were pleased, you know, when we got here that, you know, the things were pretty well set up and that we were limited in the findings that we received. And the most important thing for us is that we get an unqualified opinion, which we were able to do for both the main city audit as well as the federal audit. Just to give a few, a few, Rob and I can talk a little bit of a few about some of the findings that we got.

We did receive one on suspension and debarment.

What we've asked for that one is to ask our procurement department to basically set up any vendor that's set up,

especially on the ones on federal awards and things, they check that.

There's a website that we can go to to check that, and then we print off a copy, so we have a copy of that.

So we want to make that more complete, I guess.

Ultimately, hopefully with Workday or something,

we can maybe have the system automatically do that.

That's what I'd like to get to,

but that'll be a few years from now.

Another audit finding we receive

is on the value of land held in CPED.

For that one, we do have a new accounting manager there.

They meet with, we've set up a regular series of meetings.

I believe it's at least quarterly, if not monthly,

and they review the records on Salesforce,

which keeps our land transactions with what we have

in our general ledger, so we've been working on that

as well, too.

And then finally, for the subrecipient monitoring,

that's a federal finding, that's updated,

like when we get grants from the federal government,

we have to pass those on to what's called subrecipients

to help us manage the grant.

We were obligated to monitor them

and make sure they're following the rules.

For that one, we did kind of restructure one FTE

to kind of beef up the support in that area.

So we do expect to do a pre-award assessment

on any sub-recipient that we have in the city

to make sure that they're monitored.

And we review their financial statements and audits

as well too to make sure they're in compliance.

And then we have kind of various levels of letters

that we send out to these sub-recipients.

And if they're fine, we tell them they're fine.

And if they're not, then we have various levels

of how much we want to talk to them.

Or worst case, we might have to think about

whether we can continue to do business.

But fortunately, we don't have any sub-recipients

that are anywhere near that category.

For the last one, I'm going to turn this over to Rob.

That's our most concerning finding

is with some of the software vendors.

We're now required to do what's called a SOC 1 type 2.

They have to do an audit on themselves

to make sure that there isn't things happening.

These are like hosted financial systems.

and there was one on the convention center that I'll let

Deputy Controller Rob Lang speak to at this time.

Quite a bit has happened there.

Welcome.

Yes, thank you, George, and good morning.

So for this finding, it is related to the SOC 1 type 2s,

which as George mentioned, we have financial softwares

that are required to be internally audited to show to us

that the information coming from those financial softwares

into the city's general ledger is appropriate.

For the convention center, the software we use

wasn't able to produce such a report.

So we have developed an internal review process

to go through that information,

verify that it is appropriate,

as well as working with momentous leadership

to figure out a plan moving forward to get those reports.

And that's my status on that.

Thank you.

Yeah, thanks, Rob.

So yeah, this is something we're working with IT

to implement citywide.

We have a list of all the systems

that have a major material effect

on our financial statements.

and we plan to monitor them every year,

just like we do the federal subrecipients

to make sure they have these audits.

It's kind of a new and evolving area in the audit world

since so many systems are now hosted

and not hosted by our own servers,

so the auditors need some assurance

that everything is going well and that are accurate

and things aren't being siphoned off or things like that.

With that, certainly, Rob and I can take any questions

you may have.

Any questions from members?

Just really quick, for the convention center financial software,

is this an issue where the vendor has the capability to do this audit

and we need to just push them to generate that audit on our behalf,

or is this a thing where we might have to work with a different vendor

that actually has these types of standards in place?

Yes, excellent question, Chair Payne.

No, they certainly have the capability to get this audit.

Now, whether they've agreed to that or not,

Rob, I don't know if you have anything more to say,

but not exactly.

They haven't fully agreed, so that is still on the table.

I hate to say it.

Thank you.

Okay, thanks.

Seeing no further questions or comments from committees,

I will direct the clerk to receive and file this report.

And next we have item six,

which is receiving and filing an Assurance Services Report

on Revenue Collections for Audit Phase 2 of the Minneapolis Park and Rec Board, I will

invite Mr. Pudyal to introduce this item.

Good morning, Chair Payne and the member of the audit committee.

We recently completed the revenue and collection audit for the Minneapolis Park and Recreation

Board and I'm here to present the results.

As I go through the presentation, if you have any questions, we also have Julie Wiseman,

the finance director, and Chad Lauber, the IT director, here to answer some of those

questions as well.

So these are the overall areas we're going to cover for the audit during this presentation.

From the background, audit objectives, scope and methodology, conclusion and results, observation,

recommendations, management action plans, and any questions that you have in the end.

So regarding the background, the Minneapolis Park and Recreational Board, NPRB, serves

as an independently elected semi-autonomous body responsible for governing, maintaining

and developing the Minneapolis park system.

MPRB provides services to park visitors, residents and local businesses.

Payment collection is decentralized with revenue coming from rental, ice arenas, golf courses,

parks, rec centers, sports programs, seasonal activities and concession agreements.

NPRB staff play a key role in this process by collecting payments directly from park users.

NPRB accepts multiple forms of payment including cash checks, credit cards, and debit cards.

Collection sites are responsible for monitoring their own revenue collection process.

They also work with NPRB finance department to reconcile revenue with NPRB's financial systems.

the project.

The project is a project.

The project is a project.

The project is a project.

Finance department staff reviews reports from collection points and monitor for accuracy.

So to give credit to the NPRB management, NPRB was already in process of reviewing its own policies and procedures as we started this audit.

So this proactive work reflects strong commitment to its mission and to the safety of park visitors and staff.

The objective of this audit was to review the design and effectiveness of controls around NPRB's revenue collection process.

And talking about the scope, we reviewed how NPRB manages revenue across its collection points, including rec centers, parks, golf courses, lake facilities, and NPRB headquarters.

covered transactions from January 1st, 2022 through June 30th, 2025.

We focused on how NPRB collects various types of payments,

including online transactions, credit cards, cash checks, and money orders.

We also examined the consensus agreements as well.

We used audit methods such as interviews, site visits,

process observation key control testing. As a part of this audit we covered key

areas such as governance, collection process and associated internal controls,

concession agreements, safety and security of staff and revenue collected

and data security. So the overall conclusion of this audit is that NPRB

should strengthen its policy procedures and internal controls related to revenue

and collection to ensure consistent and effective management.

So in terms of results, so there were total seven issues

that were found as part of this audit.

So there were one rated as high and six rated as moderate

that were identified during this audit.

We'll go through each of them in details

in subsequent slides.

So the first one is related to handling customer information.

NPRB should strengthen policies, procedures, training, and oversight related to handling

customer information to adequately safeguard customer data and comply with payment card

industry data security standards, which in short we call PCI DSS.

We noted that one of the sites most staff understood their duties.

However, staff have written down customer credit card information when the credit card system was not functioning correctly.

In addition, we also found outdated references to PCI DSS, which was retired in March 2024.

Moreover, PCI compliance procedures did not include guidance related to customer credit card data protection.

Also, credit card terminals inspections were not consistently performed and reported.

So as a result, we recommend IT and finance department management to update policy and

procedures and training documents to reflect correct version of PCI DSS. Ensured roles,

responsibilities, and oversight are designed so that defined terminal inspection and security

awareness, create training materials, train all staff involved in revenue collection,

and manage the training through the web-based training portal and strictly prohibit the

stories of credit card data on paper.

The next one is related to policy and procedures.

Policy and procedures related to cash handling are not reviewed in a timely manner and do

not clearly define the roles and responsibilities of collection point supervisors and managers.

In addition, most of the collection point visitors did not have their own procedures

for collection beyond the collection system's payment processing steps.

So as a result, we recommend IT and finance department management regularly review and

update cash handling policy, clearly define the roles and responsibilities of the collection

point and supervisors' managers, establish a policy management process that provides

guidance to review policies and procedures as well as direct all collection point supervisors

and managers to create and establish specific procedures for their own collection point.

So the third one is related to oversight and monitoring. We observed that finance department

works with collection points to ensure funds are collected, reconciled and appropriately

deposited. However, they do not conduct periodic reviews of cash handling internal controls.

In addition, we observed that the collection point supervisors and managers monitor and

oversee the collection process. However, their duties are not documented in the cash handling

policies and procedures. As a result, we recommend finance department management strengthen oversight

duties by performing periodic reviews of cash handling internal controls and also define

the oversight roles and responsibilities of collection point supervisors and managers.

The fourth issue we identified was related to internal controls. There is a lack of control

during transfer of accountability at various collection points. Specifically, reconciliation

is not completed between shifts. There is a lack of access control around the safe at

one of the collection points we tested. Also, staff do not immediately endorse checks for

deposit when collected as required by policy. Instead, supervisors endorse checks when preparing

the deposits at the end of the day. In addition, there is not a centralized mailroom to properly

handle mail payments, nor is there a documented process that defines roles and responsibilities

to ensure separation of duties. So as a result, we recommend finance department

management periodically review. Controls in the collection process establish control to

address deficiencies specifically when performing reconciliation between shifts and access controls

to the safe. Require staff to endorse checks immediately and ensure stamps are available

to the collection site managers and supervisors and also create a mailroom process with effective

controls. The fifth issue is related to training. The NPRB Finance Department has not developed

training as outlined in its implementation section of the cash handling policy. We observed

that collection point leaders trained staff on the payment process using the point of

sale system, but there is no revenue collection process training. PCI DSS training video is

available however many staff members who process payments are not aware of such

training that exists. As a result we recommend Finance Department to create

and establish training materials and make them available through MPRB training

portal. Work with city management to allow MPRB staff access cash handling

training while developing their own training material. Work with IT and HR

to update training related to PCI DSS to include up-to-date standards and also once those things

are completed, systematically track and monitor training through training portal.

So the next one is concession agreement.

We observed that NPRB has not formalized a process to perform inspections of concession

of consensual accounting records, even though MPRB generally reserves the right to perform

monthly inspection, it has only conducted a review of two to three consensual accounting

records via email annually. As a result, we recommend Finance Department Management regularly

conduct inspection of contractor books and records and establish procedures for conducting

such inspections.

And the last issue is related to security over assets.

We learned that most of staff felt safe in their work environment and staff were aware

that they should contact Park Police in the event of an emergency.

However, we observed that not all collection points had documented emergency safety plans

and some sites lacked other conventional security technology to safeguard MPRB property and

personnel. In addition, policy doesn't clearly define roles and responsibilities for who

can transport deposits. As a result, we recommend finance department management, strengthen

policy by clearly defining procedures and oversight mechanism to ensure staff safety,

the security around facilities and provide security measures deemed necessary, and update

policies to clearly define the roles and responsibilities associated with transporting the deposits.

And coming to the management action plan, so NPRB management has agreed to recommendations

included in the report. They also have drafted their action plans accordingly. Based on our

review of those action plans, we are confident that they'll effectively

remediate the issues identified during the audit. The detailed management action

plans are included in the report for each observations as well. I stand for any

questions that you might have. Thank you for that presentation. Are there any

questions for members? Member Williams. Thank you. Can I just clarify something on

on issue one of the staff writing down credit card information.

It says in the recommendation that you're going to update policies,

procedures, training documents.

Does the training today or previously state that credit card information

should be written down in the event that the credit card system

is not working appropriately?

So basically the only time they were taking credit card information

is whenever some of the machines were not working

and they were shredding that later on.

But the goal is not to even take the information on paper

so they can utilize some of the other sites

and contact them to take the payment that way

so that it can be taken electronically

instead of writing those information on paper.

The reason I'm asking that question is it said

that we're going to update procedures in the training documents.

I think what I'm trying to decipher is, did the training document say, in the event that this machine is not working, you should write it down?

And now we're updating that to say, now you should not do that?

Okay.

So we have Julie Wiseman, the finance director here, so she'll be able to answer.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Welcome.

Thank you, Chair Payne and Member Williams.

The current policy does state that you can write it down and shred it.

And so we do need to eliminate that from the policy.

Okay.

That helps.

Thank you.

Member Hausman.

Specifically, oh, thank you, Chair Payne.

I guess specifically about issue one, but just generally, did audit observe any, I don't want to call them breaches,

but any issues where there was a mispayment or fraudulent attempts during this audit?

or was it just that this needs to be kind of tightened up

so that that cannot happen in the future?

We didn't observe those issues, and even some of these,

as a part of the process understanding,

some of the staff mentioned that to us.

So it's not we observed that they were taking credit card information,

but that's what we were told by the staff.

Perfect. Thank you.

Member Abena.

Thank you, Chair Payne.

Okay, so I was glad to be able to read the materials ahead of time as well,

And I'm really grateful that this audit was completed.

In fact, I think I was here when in this role, when the city's version of this was, was conducted.

So I'm glad to see this is completed.

And I'm also reassured that the park board was working on their own internal policies and handling.

And I actually have to just say one more bit of editorializing.

I really am actually glad that the park board accepts so many different ways of, of paying, because there are people that really do need to want to operating with cash or need to operate with cash.

So one of the things, and it was more in the write-up and less in the presentation,

but there was a piece where the park board has kind of a follow-up task to do the on-site procedures documentation for the specific site procedures.

And I'm worried, is that going to be, how customized is that going to be, or will that be, I see Ms. Wiseman's coming,

or what will be the approach there?

Because that has me a little concerned.

That seems like a lot.

Chair Payne and a member of NA, we have categories of sites.

So our recreation centers will have a site-specific procedure that will be the same for all recreation centers.

Their business is typically the same.

We'll have site-specific procedures for all of our golf courses that will be the same.

So I'm estimating about 10 separate site-specific procedures,

and I've already completed with the site managers four out of

those 10.

Oh, that's reassuring because I know that actually some

employees move between locations, and so that's reassuring.

Thank you.

Not seeing any other questions.

So I will direct the clerk to receive and file this report and direct staff to publish

the report.

All those in favour say aye.

Aye.

Opposed say nay.

That carries and we will have that report published.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Item 7 is approving updates to the audit charter.

I will invite Robert Timmerman, city auditor,

to present on that item.

Right, good morning Chair Payne and audit committee members.

Before MPRB leaves us, I do wanna just acknowledge

their cooperation during the audit,

but also the fact that when we started our audit,

they had asked us to delay because they were already in progress on self-reviewing their

procedures and so I think it's worth recognizing that they take seriously the oversight responsibility

that they have. So I wanted to mention that. Getting into the audit charter, this has been

a collaborative effort between the audit committee at our last meeting. We went through and had

a fairly robust discussion about some of the what should be included what should

not be included in the audit charter after that meeting we worked with the

city attorney's office to make sure that the things that we had discussed were

agreeable on a legal level and that brings us to our what I what I think is

maybe our final product barring any final tweaks or amendments that you

recommend today. So this was shared with you a few days ago so I hope you had an

opportunity to review it. I think that if you do have any final suggestions we

can incorporate those quickly but today we're looking for approval and then

Chair Payne and I can sign this and we can get it out on the websites and in

our own documents for future use.

Any questions from members?

Do we need to take a formal motion on this?

Yeah.

All right.

I will move to approve the audit charter as presented.

Is there a second?

Second.

Do we need to do a roll call?

Let's do a roll call.

Why not?

Call the girl.

Abeni.

Aye.

Chukti is absent.

Hosbein.

Aye.

Omar is absent.

Williams.

Aye.

Singleton.

Aye.

Chair Payne.

Aye.

There are five ayes.

That item carries and then we'll just get that printed out.

and signed so that we can get it published.

Last is the report of the city auditor,

and I will again invite Mr. Timmerman up to give an update.

We'll get through this update quickly

and stand for any questions at the conclusion.

Today our updates include in progress and completed work.

A quick update on where we're at

with fraud, waste and abuse investigations,

just with some statistics, an update on prior audit issues

and following up on those.

So as you know, we regularly reach back out to the audities

and ask for updates on their corrective action plans.

So this is an update on that work.

And then some other updates, just logistical updates

as far as personnel budget and some things

that are relevant to your roles as well.

So, completed work. I will skip right through this because this is a report that you heard from Director Pudyal on.

This was voted on and published today for the MPRB Revenue Collections Audit.

Work in progress. We've got quite a bit going on right now.

We've got a review, which is a state-required audit.

audit this is of the Minneapolis Police Department's body worn camera and

automatic automated license plate reader systems we've done this review recently

for Park Police and now we are doing this for MPD this is in the field work

stage we're also in the field work stage for an NSD a neighborhood safety

department audit to look at contract management NSD as we've talked about in

the past has gone through some significant changes in their contract

oversight in the last year. I think that some of the the work that they've done

has really demonstrated the type of oversight we want to see in other

departments as well that can be adopted by the enterprise as a whole. That said,

they're leading up to some of those changes. There were some concerns that

audit had that NSD leadership has also self acknowledged so that is some work

that is in progress that we hope to bring to early next year other in progress

work the after-action reviews of the shooting of Davis Maturi as well as the

death of Alison Lucia we spoke at our October audit committee meeting about

some delays that we were experiencing I'm happy to share that we've gotten

And over that hurdle, we've got a number of meetings scheduled with individual officers

who were involved in responding to some of these calls.

And those should be happening within the next week or two.

We've had a number of meetings with MPD SWAT as well as the chief's office.

So we're making good progress.

I do think that the final report from our consultant will probably be released at our

April Audit Committee meeting.

I know in the past we've targeted February and now April, so the work is coming to a

point where I feel fairly confident that that's the Audit Committee meeting that this report

will be released at.

work in progress we have kicked off the ShotSpotter performance audit this is an

audit that the City Council as well as the audit committee was interested in

this is going to be a an interesting audit because one of our new auditors

hills from the city of Chicago which is one of the cities that has done a report

on ShotSpotter and has made some decisions based on their work and so I'm

excited to have Mack K. Waters who has joined us recently, our newest addition.

He's starting to take a look at this work as well as a few of our other

auditors. So we hire folks and we get them right to work. So I'm very excited

about that. Procurement phase two, this is a follow-up to a phase one report that

we did specifically about a contract for an event that occurred at the

Convention Center. We had committed on our audit plan to doing a phase two that

looks more broadly at procurement. That's the purpose of this audit. We did want to

take a look at one program specifically as a part of this to kind of do a a

walkthrough of process and we'll be doing that with Meet Minneapolis. The

city provides a significant amount of funding to Meet Minneapolis. There are

contracts and meet Minneapolis maintain subcontracts and so we're going to take

a look at contracting and controls with that organization as an example and then

look at controls more broadly as well. And then the work that you will get from

us in February the enterprise risk assessment we are in the midst of about

35 meetings with department heads and leaders across the city including audit

committee members and city council members as well as department heads to

get an idea of where risks exist in this city. We will evaluate those risks and

write them by considering the likelihood and the impact of those risks and then

we will develop communication for management. The idea with this risk

assessment is for management to have something in hand that they can refer to throughout

the year and start creating mitigating strategies for those risks.

And then finally the audit plan.

As you know every year we have an audit plan.

This year it's going to be a separate document from the risk assessment.

I think that helps for those who need or want to use the risk assessment.

audit plan is not necessarily relevant to them so the audit plan will be a

separate document and it'll look a little different in the sense that we're

going to calculate based off of available auditable hours. The standard

when developing an audit plan typically considers that an auditor has the

ability to use 70% of their time or in some cases 75% of their time for audit.

So we will calculate based on our current staffing levels, determine what ability we have to perform the audits.

And to one of your questions, Committee Member Williams, you had asked about prioritization in February this past year.

And we will make great efforts to prioritize a reasonable amount of audits based on those auditable hours.

As far as our fraud, waste, and abuse investigations, these are typically referrals that we get

in through the website, emails, phone calls.

We have two in progress.

As you know, we do not share much for details on these because of the sensitive nature of

them.

And then I think I will just hand it off to Director Pudyal here to start talking about

the open issues and some of the validation work that the office has done since our last

meeting.

Chair Payne and members of the audit committee.

So regarding the prior audit issues, we closed six open issues since the last audit committee

meeting but then we added seven today.

So it's like a kind of plus one to the category.

So we have 10 open issues, which includes also seven that we issued today.

And 22 of them are also like overdue audit issues that we have been actively working

on resolving those with the management as well.

And we have four of them in validation in progress.

So basically, we at least get partial or full supporting documents from the management and

And we're right now leaving those to make sure those are completely remediated.

So six of those closed issues are, so we closed two issues from the 2021 personal work issued,

mobile device policies and control audit.

And so that's issue number two, mobile device inventory management,

and then issue number three, mobile device disposal.

So for that audit, we only have one issue remaining to completely remediate issues from that report.

So we also completed close two issues from the 2023 revenue and collection audit phase one, which we reviewed for the city.

And we closed out issue number one, policy and procedures, and issue number three, internal controls.

So they still have three more issues.

And hopefully we should be remediating at least one sometime this week as well.

So we're working with the management to resolve some of these issues as well.

And then again, we resolved two issues for the 2024 NCR funding to neighborhood organizational audit as well.

So that's issue number two, policy and procedures.

And issue number three, oversight and monitoring.

So for this one, we just had like one audit issue remaining, which is not due till January

2026, so it's still time.

So these are all the reports that with at least one audit, open audit issues.

And I have detailed information in the subsequent slides as well.

And these are all the ones from today's audit.

So like I said earlier, we have three open issues for the 2019 MPD off-duty work audit

and the management provided that update today.

We have one open issues related to the personal work issued mobile device policies and controls

audit related to the data governance and we're working with management to resolve this issue

as well.

We have two open issues for the 2022 Hiring and Promotion Process audit.

So the first one, issue number five, hopefully we'll be able to remediate by the end of first

quarter or early second quarter of 2026.

And issue number 16, to be honest, this should close out sometime this week as well.

So the next open issues are related to 2023 Revenue and Collection Phase 1 audit.

We have issue number two, oversight and monitoring.

Issue number five, asset safeguarding and security.

And issue number seven, mail handling.

And we're working with management to remediate these issues as well.

The next two open issues are non-public, so that's why you just mentioned issue one and issue two.

So that's related to 2023 sexual assault examination kit, special project follow-up audit.

And management did provide an update back in during June audit committee meeting,

but we'll be following up with them as well regarding these two issues.

So the next audit is 2023 MPD property and evidence audit. So right now we have seven

open issues and the issue number one and two are non-public and they provided the update during

the June audit committee meeting as well and we'll be following up with them again soon to

get the status of those open issues.

So the next one is 2023 PCART spending audit.

So we have one issue open, issue number three, oversight and monitoring.

And so for this one, controller's office is responsible to remediate.

And as George earlier said, they have been busy remediating some of those priority items as well

related to the internal controls.

but we'll be working with them to resolve this issue as well.

So the next audit is 2024 MPD Fleet Management Audit.

So we have nine open issues right now.

We'll do that and the management provided that update today regarding all those open issues.

and the last one is led to the 2024 NCR city funding to neighborhood organizational audit

and for that one we just have one issue open related to risk assessment

and the tentative date for that completion is January 30th 31st 2026

and any questions yes remember husband thank you chair pain I just made more of

a comment so slide 9 it's the table of open out of issues overdue on issues

and then the supporting table yes I think it's a sign of a really good

program and thank you to all the work to have things added each meeting I think

the number that is always not concerning, but that I want to focus on is that 22, like the overdue

items. And I just wonder if it's worth, um, I appreciate the updates, but is it worth saying

maybe like out of 22, 20 of them we have management updates from, yes, we know they're being worked on

and maybe use this slide as kind of a, a trigger point to say, we really need support from the

committee or whatever for maybe these two overdue items that we're just not getting the response we

needed. So I guess my question, that's a long way of asking a question, of out of the 22,

do you have any that are overdue that you're not feeling like you're getting the support

or the follow-up on? So out of those 22, like some of these, like the MPD,

fleet management, those are about the overdue as well. And for some, like I mentioned, for

the revenue and collection, right now the priority is to make sure the internal controls

related to the convention center gets taken care of before they focus. So it's not

they're not willing to do that, but it's just like when you try to prioritize more important stuff,

then I know this is more important as well, but based on their limitation with their staff,

they just need to prioritize their resources, and that's why we have some of those overdues as well.

So it's not completely like they need resources or like they're not willing to resolve some of these issues.

But there are some by two months, three months, some are more like some of the older ones.

But the other ones, it's all less than six months or so.

So I'm pretty confident they'll be able to close that out in the future.

Perfect.

Yeah, and for future meetings, just if there's any that are kind of raising to that level,

would just really appreciate that kind of like identification of these are the two that we're

really not seeing movement on for without justification like that one i appreciate the

conversation today about how they need to prioritize that but if there are any other ones that come up

and and i would just say another thank you when i first started that number i think all the overdue

audits were like 10 years ago so i really appreciate that the the overdues are much more

recent so thank you for that and even like we try to bring management on an annual basis

so that they can cover some of those overdued issues as well.

Perfect. Thank you.

All right. Thank you.

Member Williams.

Thank you, Chair Payne.

Maybe in that same vein, and I apologize for the naivete in this,

but you have a 2019 open audit issue that we heard about today.

I'm assuming that there's a schedule in which you will have that audit come back up again.

At what point does the new audit take over the old audit?

And if that question doesn't make sense.

It depends on the area as well and the size of those areas and what we're actually looking at.

So sometimes some of those cyclical audit, it depends on whether it's five, seven, ten years.

It depends on the topic and the process that we'll be reviewing.

but we do have the opportunity audit in our future plans as well.

So we will be looking at those, whether, you know,

those things are resolved or not based on the earlier findings.

But as MPD has mentioned, so some of these findings we know won't be

remediated in at least in like two, three years,

because they have plans to bring some of these new technologies in 2027.

So we know for sure, you know, that might take time.

Okay.

But we do revisit some of these processes based on how crucial that process is for the city.

Okay, that makes sense. Thank you.

And then maybe one more just real quick comment, and this might be more for the city auditor.

We talked about in-progress work, the procurement phase two,

and it's talking about the procurement processes and the oversight activity.

Can I also mention, if it's not already thought about, the background check of the vendors who are also going to potentially win contracts.

Is that also part of the scope of that procurement process?

Chair Payne and Committee Member Williams, typically yes.

When I've done audits like this in the past, we certainly look at that.

this audit is in the pre-planning stage, I would say.

And so I will note that to make sure that that is included in our methodology.

I think that's very important.

Different contracts or types of contracts require different types of background,

whether that's an individual having a certain certification

or a certain makeup of their leadership team.

we will look into those things.

Thank you.

You're welcome.

Vice Chair Singleton.

Thank you.

A question on two of the overdue audit items,

slides 19 and 20,

the sexual assault examination kit audit

and the MPD property and evidence audit.

My memory from our June update

was that there were some constraints

related to investment

that were causing delays and remediating a couple of those issues?

Do you know if there's any movement in that regard?

To be exact, I need to follow up with the management first before I answer that question.

Thank you.

Not seeing any more questions.

Thank you for the presentation and the update.

And I'll ask the clerk to file that report.

Chair, I'm sorry.

I do have just a few additional slides of other updates.

It won't take too long here.

So I do like to provide some updates on where we're at with staffing, considering the council's

investment in our office this past summer and also their deliberations to further invest

in our office for 2026.

We're excited to share that we've brought on two new auditors that once our

Special Review and Advisory Services Division is fully created with a director

to help lead that. Eric Wynn and Matt Kaywaters have joined us they will be in

that division. Eric comes from the Legislative Auditor's Office at the

state level. As I mentioned earlier Matt comes from similar public safety

oversight from the city of Chicago. So we're very excited to have both of them

and their experience. Currently we're going through background checks for an

internal auditor, one candidate to fill a vacant position as well as an internal

auditor to this was Kamalina Leeds position and if he's watching for

whatever reason I just want to thank him. He was also incredibly involved in that

NPRB audit that we heard about today as well as Nikita she helped pull

everything together at the end so thank you to both of them but interviews are in

progress for that position and then our quality assurance and training manager

we should be performing interviews on that within the next couple weeks here

as far as budget updates that impact the office of city auditor council is voting

on budget amendments now, today, and they're finalizing the 2026 budget this week. Optimistically,

our office will retain all current FTEs based on amendments that are currently for consideration,

and we will also secure funding, hopefully, for the Director of Special Review and Advisory

Services so we can build out that division, as well as a lead worker for that division that may

crossover between internal audit and the special review division. Unfortunately,

every department has to, you know, play a game of push and pull and this year it

doesn't look like we'll be able to have the funding for the deputy city auditor

and that's okay. We will go back to the drawing board next year. We will further

discuss the needs of that role but I do think where things currently stand

budget is looking strong for our office and so I do appreciate the work from the

council members including the committee chair. The last piece of the budget

update we did go through the process to amend the contract with Hogan Adams

which is the law firm that's assisting in our special reviews or our after-action

reviews that has been amended to get us through June of this year as I mentioned

the report should be released in April but we want to make sure that we are

considerate of any follow-up meetings other council meetings that may want an

update and so we have just actually I'm the last signature and I just got it

this morning for that contract to be fully amendment amended we've talked a

little bit about the workforce optimization and comparative benchmarking

study and review. We've contracted with the 65th North Group, which is out of the

southwestern part of the country, but the the principal of that grew up in the

Brooklyn Center or Brooklyn Park area. So he's very familiar with Minneapolis, very

familiar with the Twin Cities, and was very excited to take on this work. We've

had a kickoff meeting with him and we will soon be meeting with the COO as

well as the Commissioner of Community Safety because we will want some

collaborative efforts from them to share with their department heads and other

leaders in the city that surveys will be coming out and meetings will follow and

so this will kind of follow closely after the meetings that we have for our

annual risk assessment and this work is to understand tools that different

departments have implemented to pursue cost savings. It's to compare staffing levels in various departments to sister cities. So I think this will be a very helpful study that will result in recommendations that come from the contractor, but also from our office that should hopefully help the city council in their budget work next year.

The last of our updates, the next year in January, we need to have an organizational

meeting for the Audit Committee.

So with a new City Council, that means that potentially there could be new City Council

members on this Audit Committee.

And that's true also for the NPRB representative on this committee.

So the City Council and NPRB will be deciding on their leadership and who they will appoint

to this committee.

And that needs to be sorted out in early January.

And then for the citizen members on this committee, you've all been appointed to three-year terms,

which I believe have just at the end of this year completed.

So the clerk has asked that when the information goes out, that if you're interested, please

express that interest, reapply, and that will get sorted out hopefully by the time we have

that organizational meeting on the 26th.

At that meeting, that's also when leadership for this committee is determined.

Also at that meeting, the rules of the audit committee.

I don't know if you know that this document exists.

I think I mentioned it a few months ago, but it was last updated in 2010.

It still has some very specific language that you can tell is for our old government structure.

So I think we'll bring this to that meeting to start a discussion about updating rules.

I think there's a lot in there that we can just remove because it's been included in our updated audit charter.

and so we can focus more on Robert's rules and actual logistics for holding these meetings.

Last thing, we have been advised by the clerk's office to only send email communications to city

of Minneapolis emails. I know that's a challenge, especially for some of our resident members,

because you don't check those emails very frequently. That is something we're going to

start doing in January and you know we'll see how it goes. We'll see by that January meeting if

people are seeing what we need them to see and we may come up with a way to send to your private

email or your personal email just a note. Hey go look at your city email. So but this helps with

data requests and ensuring that you know information is managed transparently which

of course our office is a proponent of. Just a reminder, you guys are all really good at this.

Don't reply all when I send you something or when anybody sends something from our office,

just so we avoid creating a serial meeting or unintentionally having quorum in any emails.

I usually blind CC the audit committee, but every once in a while I'll send it to everyone

and I'll just put a note on there, please don't reply all.

That's it. We are staffing up. We're at nine folks now. We should be at about 12 within the next six weeks, which is our target for 2025. And then with the funding that council's working through right now, we may be able to be at 14 of the 15 by mid-year in 2026.

So I'm really happy about that.

One of the primary objectives that I've had

over the last 10 months is to right-size the office,

but also to elevate it to the level that the citizens

or the residents of Minneapolis voted for this office

to be at, and so that's where a lot of the focus has been.

That is it for today.

We will gladly accept any questions

or just you're welcome to also email us

with questions after the meeting too.

Thank you, Mr. Timmerman.

Any questions?

Okay.

Now I can direct the clerk to receive and file that report.

And I just want to take an opportunity to,

this being our last meeting of the year

and the last meeting of the term, thank everybody.

This has been an intense season of change, I'll say.

I want to thank Mr. Timmerman.

You came in midstream to a lot that was happening.

I want to thank Mr. Pujol, especially for stepping in into a leadership role while there was a lot going on.

And as you said, the residents created the city auditor when we created the strong mayor system in 2021.

2022 was a heavy focus on the administration and restructuring the administrative side of our government.

We reconstituted the audit committee under the new form of government in 2023.

We had a mid-term change on council, and I came on to chair in 2024.

We got a new city auditor.

We had to move staff out of the auditor's office.

We are adding staff into the auditor's office.

you've taken on. I mean, I think your very first day in council chambers, the family of Allison

Luscher was demanding justice for Allison, and you were able to really navigate that with a lot of,

I don't know, candor, clarity, and I'm just really grateful for your leadership and everybody

here and all of our auditors. You guys have just been rock stars all along, so just wanted to say

a note of appreciation and I'm hoping to come back as chair next term but again

that's not up to me that's up to the body so hopefully everybody gets a good

rest between now and then and I hope to see everybody back next year. Thank you

Chair Payne thank you audit committee it's been fun this year hope to see you

all next year. All right well seeing no further business before us and without

objection I will declare this meeting adjourned

sorry yeah the

Thank you.