PRIEST RIVER — The West Bonner County School District has been advised by the Idaho Department of Education that it may withhold further funding if the district does not submit its fiscal year 2025 audit by Nov. 15.

WBCSD has been facing ongoing issues with its yearly audits after it fell behind on its 2023 audit while waiting for results of a forensic audit. The district is now 22 months overdue on its 2023 audit and 10 months overdue on the 2024 audit, IDE officials wrote in a letter to the district. As a result of the 2024 audit being late, the state has already withheld $177,482 in funding from the district. 

WBCSD Superintendent Kim Spacek said that the district has fully cooperated with the auditor firm, Clifton Allen Larson, throughout the process. He had a meeting with the CLA last Thursday to push for a timely reception of the 2023 audit. 

"We laid out what the State Department of Education had sent us and talked about timelines and asked for an email back for a date when our fiscal year 2023 audit could be completed,” Spacek said. “The date was agreed upon as Oct. 9.” 

At last Wednesday’s WBCSD’s board meeting, trustees expressed frustration at the situation and CLA. 

“What kind of pressure can we apply to CLA saying, ‘Hey you got to hold this liability, you’re responsible for making us tardy on these audits,’” Trustee Paul Turco said. “I just think there would be something that we could do more to protect our district.” 

At the meeting, Spacek said that CLA told the district in April that the 2023 audit would be completed in September with the 2024 audit completed by the end of October. Spacek said that other circumstances at CLA stretched out the timeline. 

WBCSD is currently planning to have CLA conduct its fiscal year 2024 audit, but Spacek said that what happens around that Oct. 9 deadline will determine if the district moves forward with CLA. As of now, the district and CLA have talked about completing the 2024 audit in February 2026. 

However, he said the district is in talks to switch to Hayden Ross, a Moscow-based firm that conducts the yearly audits for the Lake Pend Oreille School District, for WBCSD’s 2025 audit. 

“If the timing was right as far as getting things completed, we felt that the other firm could get [2025 audit] done by Feb. 15,” Spacek said. “So, we would be completely caught up.” 

However, the Spacek said the firm wants to see WBCSD’s 2024 audit before accepting the job, which could create an issue with timing. In the letter, Idaho’s Deputy Superintendent Spencer Barzee said that a timely submittal of the 2025 audit, which is due in November, is “consequential.” 

If WBCSD cannot submit the 2025 audit before Nov. 10 or Feb. 5, 2026, then both of the district’s state payments will be withheld, according to the letter.  

Barzee wrote in the letter that if the district can demonstrate significant progress toward completion of the audits and the auditor provides a written commitment to a certain timeframe, that the IDE will considering releasing those state funds to allow for WBCSD to meet their current financial obligations. 

A second letter also detailed that because the district is out of compliance with its federal audit requirements that federal funding for the school district is being withheld as well.  

"While this evidence of corrective action allowed IDE to conditionally approve federal grant applications and maintain funding for ESEA and IDEA programs, the district has now failed to meet the corrective timelines for two consecutive years,” Barzee wrote. 

As of Sept.12, the date of the letter, WBCSD’s federal grant reimbursements have been frozen, and it cannot be approved for any fiscal year 2026 grants until the IDE receives the district’s 2023 and 2024 audits.  

Spacek said at the meeting that these audits are a priority for the district to limit the impact on students and touched on renovating WBCSD’s practices to make it more audit friendly in the future.  

“We are all working together to, yes, get the back audits done,” Spacek said. “But long-term the idea is that no matter what’s going on at the district, we’ve got to get this stuff done for our students and community.”