| Public Release Date: March 12, 1999 | No. 99-19 |
The Minnesota State Colleges and Universities (MnSCU) system began operations on July 1, 1995. The new MnSCU system combined the former state university system and the former community college system with the technical colleges which had been local government entities prior to the merger. A 15-member board of trustees, appointed by the Governor, oversees the activities of MnSCU. Morris J. Anderson is the chancellor of the MnSCU system.
Our primary audit objective was to render an opinion on the State of Minnesota's financial statements. Our audit scope was limited to those MnSCU activities material to the state's general purpose financial statements for the year ended June 30, 1998. Another audit objective was to determine compliance with federal requirements.
We qualified our report, dated December 1, 1998, on the State of Minnesota's general purpose financial statements because sufficient audit evidence did not exist to support Minnesota's disclosures with respect to the year 2000. Auditing the state's and MnSCU's year 2000 compliance efforts was not an objective of this audit. As a result, we do not provide assurance that MnSCU is or will be year 2000 ready, that its year 2000 remediation efforts will be successful in whole or in part, or that parties with which MnSCU does business will be year 2000 ready.
For the areas audited, MnSCU's financial activities were fairly presented in the State of Minnesota's general purpose financial statements for the year ended June 30, 1998. MnSCU colleges and universities did not, however, submit complete and accurate information to the system office for certain financial activities. We also found that some capital project expenditures were not recorded in the correct fiscal year, and some colleges and universities used incorrect funds to report financial activities. In addition, the system office did not fully document differences between Agency Fund financial statements and financial activity recorded on the accounting system.
For the federal programs tested, MnSCU administered the programs in compliance with federal requirements, except that we noted some overpayments to students. We also noted minor unallowable and undocumented disbursements for the Carl D. Perkins Vocational Education Basic Grant program. We found internal control weaknesses related to student financial aid cash management at two campuses.
MnSCU agreed with the findings and recommendations in the audit report. MnSCU has developed a corrective action plan to resolve the findings.
