However, these issues are likely to be addressed by later reports.

During last week’s meeting, councillors asked Intentus Chartered Accountants director John O’Malley whether his audit had uncovered any breaches of council policy.

The questions were in regards to $700,000 in spending by council general manager Allen Dwyer on the Cootamundra Town Hall refurbishment.

Councillors were not aware of the refurbishment, which could end up costing almost $1 million, until last month’s budget update. 

Mr O’Malley said given the nature of the audit, it would be a “high bar” for such decisions to affect the council’s financial statements.

“Throughout the audit, were there any identification of any breaches of council policy?” Cr Penny Nicholson asked .

Mr O’Malley replied that the focus of the audit was on financial statements as a whole.

“It’s a fairly high bar. Not specifically through the audit. Certainly prior to the sign-off to the audit there has been additional scrutiny applied to credit card usage and to procurement practices, but at this point there has been no report on those as yet,” he said.

“It wasn’t seen that either of those things would have an impact on financial statements.”

Mr O’Malley was also asked by councillors if “things were being done correctly” in terms of council’s equipment and plant fund.

Mr O’Malley said he could not recall anything “off the top of my head”.

Last month’s meeting raised questions about a community group’s $25,000 tractor that Mr Dwyer added to council’s plant list.

That decision was also criticised by Mayor Abb McAlister.