County to simplify financial statements to clear audit bar

Whitman County officials have agreed on a plan to help clear the county’s annual audit hurdles – lower the bar.

Since 2002, Whitman County has assembled its annual financial statements on the intricately detailed accrual basis.

County commissioners, in concert with Auditor Eunice Coker, Treasurer Robert Lothspeich and Esther Wilson, the county’s lone finance employee, now want to switch to a simpler form of reporting, the cash basis.

“I think the department heads, for the most part, have been behind this for years,” said Coker.

Coker, Lothspeich and Partch make up the county’s finance committe...