Town accounting (January 29, 2017)

The Town of Apple Valley’s accounting doesn’t add up and there is no transparency. For years the general fund couldn’t fund expenditures without transfers. Incumbents, during last election, said general fund reserve was $4 million. The current 2016-2017 budget only reports the prior 2015-2016 year reserves at $4.4 million as of July 2015.

Now there is the electric provider program loan of $2.6 million, with another $1 million to parks and rec. Is the current general fund reserve $400,000-800,000?

Pat Orr was correct in his column on 1/10/2017 in saying the town’s electric provider program costs the town almost nothing. Ah, but it WILL cost the ratepayer/taxpayer.

Past general fund loans: $6.6 million for parks and rec and at least $3.5 million for the golf course.

Where will funding for eminent domain litigation come from? Will there be a loan from road funds while our roads crumble? Then there’s the low/mod housing program, which has spent $16 million without building anything. And don’t forget the ever-increasing unfunded CalPERS liability.

Council gave Town Manager inter-fund loan authority not to exceed $10 million per fund, $60 million in total, and suggests they can bond up to $200 million to acquire the water company. How much more debt will there be when the Town decides to build its own energy generation facilities (per the documents)?

And there needs to be money for ongoing litigation due to the Town’s past lack of legal compliance. There may be more to come, as closed sessions routinely have no reportable action.

Will the public be surprised when it is too late and our debt is far over their you know what? Is Apple Valley going the way of Beaumont, Bell, San Bernardino, and Stockton?

— Leane Lee, Apple Valley

Published: Daily Press, February 7, 2017