East Haven School Board Hires Forensic Auditor To Go Over Books

EAST HAVEN, CT - The Board of Education, at its most recent meeting, hired the firm Shipman and Goodwin to do a general forensic audit of how school bills are paid. The board said, at its next meting, it will make a decision, on what area it wants the audit to concentrate on.

The audit will be conducted by Steve Pedneault, of Shipman and Goodwin. He is a forensic accountant.

He and Jessica Ritter, of the firm, told the board, that the audit is not made public until it is completed but that the board will be kept apprised of the process.

The cost of the audit, the board was told, would depend on what it told the firm it wanted Pedneault to focus on.

Conducting a comprehensive audit of the schools' books was brought up several months ago by members of the Town Council, who were demanding answers when an audit report revealed that the Board of Education ran close to a $1 million deficit in fiscal year 2015-16.

During the fiscal year that ended in June of 2016, the school board spent $918,765 more than its allotted budgeted of $47.2 million.