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In a split vote, the Decherd Board of Mayor and Aldermen has hired an accounting firm to do an audit to get the city’s 2022 budget accepted by the Tennessee Comptroller of the Treasury.

The Comptroller’s Office has had problems with how the city has kept its financial records and mandated that an audit be conducted before it would accept the city’s 2022 budget.

The board agreed in a 2-1 vote on Sept. 12 to hire the G.R. Rush & Company accounting firm, based in Chattanooga, to do the audit at a cost not to exceed $24,000.

Voting in favor were Vice Mayor Larry Fraley and Alderman Glenn Summers while Alderman Justin Stubblefield was in opposition. Alderman John Corak had resigned from his position just before the meeting got underway, citing differences with Mayor Mary Nell Hess.

Stubblefield said the way he interprets the city statute about hiring professional services is that any expenditures costing more than $2,500 would require going through a bid process.

However, Hess said the city is facing an emergency situation and needs to have a firm hired quickly to do the audit. She added that conditions deem that the city would not have to go through a bid process to hire an accounting firm to do the audit.

She called on City Attorney Floyd Don Davis for an opinion.

Davis said the city would not have to go through a bid process for hiring professional services, and he defined the city’s position as being an emergency.

Summers agreed.

“It’s a little bit of an emergency situation,” he said, adding that if the audit isn’t completed, the city’s budget would remain on hold.

Hess said the city still has to have an audit done on the 2023 budget but has not received a quote from G.R. Rush, which was the only firm to apply to do the work on the 2022 audit. She added that she expects both audits to be completed soon.

After the Comptroller’s Office had found infractions in how the city has handled its budget, Decherd hired the MG Group accounting firm, based in Tullahoma, to redraft the city’s budget.

Hess said she believes the issues the city has had with its budget process will soon be corrected.

“It has been a herculean effort on all who have worked on it,” she said, referring to the budget dilemma. “MG Group has really hung in there and accomplished great things for us.”