By April: New World software to go on line

More than six years and $600,000 after it was purchased, Whitman County’s New World accounting software will be put to use in 2011.

“I’m really impressed with what we’ve been learning in these work sessions with New World,” said Treasurer Robert Lothspeich.

For the first time ever, the county will be able to track its financial transactions as they happen, according to Chris Nelson, director of the county’s information technology department.

“Everybody’s realizing that it really is coming. And I think people are really enthused about it,” said Nelson. “Because it’s really streamlining a lot of processes and will give us the ability to get information much more quickly.”

New World’s financial software was originally set to be put into action on Valentine’s Day, but Nelson said a team of county officials decided it was best to push that date back to April.

“At this point, it looks like we’re going to shoot to go live with the financial side of the New World application in April, which is a bit later than we expected, but it should come pretty quick,” said Nelson.

New World officials have been working with county officials over the past several months and will conduct training sessions each month until the system is put into use.

Commissioner Pat O’Neill last week told the Gazette a two-month delay is nothing compared to the long wait of getting it ready to use.

“It’s been sitting in a box for, what, like six years now,” said O’Neill. “I don’t think April is that bad.”

That long wait was one of the reasons commissioners decided to fire Bev Divine, county finance director, last June.

Divine in 2005 advised commissioners to purchase the software, saying it was crucial to replace the system which has been in operation since 1991.

So commissioners that year approved a $331,600 contract with Michigan-based New World Systems for the software, and it has been awaiting installation ever since.

Since that purchase, the county has paid more than $400,000 for software updates, travel for New World trainers and technical advice.

The system did not meet Washington state’s unique standards of public accounting. Only when Prosecutor Denis Tracy threatened the company with litigation in 2007 did company officials make efforts to have the software comply with those standards.

Commissioner Greg Partch last week said the system will finally give the county an accurate picture of its finances. O’Neill agreed.

“For the last seven years we have had no knowledge of where we are,” said O’Neill. “You were just throwing darts at a board and you had no idea. With New World up and running in April, we should have a pretty solid idea of our cash in May or June.”

In order to get that picture, though, commissioners voted Monday to write $216,000 off the county’s books. That number represents a discrepancy between what the county’s ledger says it has invested and what is shown on bank statements. That amount comes off the county’s cash status, which will also be used to balance the 2011 budget.

While that number may change as bank statements are better reconciled, Partch said it is close.

“We pick a number that’s about at that level and we write it off,” said Partch.

He added this method was advised by state auditors, who have cited the county in recent years for its out-of-balance bank ledger.

“We have a finding. We have an obligation to the state to reverse that finding,” said Partch.

Any extra money found in the bank statements reconciliation will be folded into the county’s cash accounts.

Until the new system goes live, the county will have to keep up its current 19-year-old system.

Commissioners last week signed a contract with Priority Support Group of Corvallis, Ore., to maintain the system. That maintenance will cost no more than $4,600. Priority Support has been maintaining the main frame for the past several years. Through October of this year, the county has paid $3,862.50 to the firm.