Residents got an explanation Wednesday night for why Antrim received an “adverse” audit rating, published in its 2025 Town Report.
Fewer than 10 residents attended a Select Board meeting to raise concerns about the designation. Jennifer Dorr, a CPA and the town’s internal auditor, said the 2024 rating — issued by independent auditors Vachon Clukay & Company — resulted from the town’s failure to submit a required actuarial evaluation of its long-term employee pension liability.
“Towns are required to submit an actuarial evaluation, but many small towns don’t do it because it is expensive, and these regulations are not really designed for small towns. They are aimed at large municipalities and school districts,” Dorr said. “Some of the larger school districts I work with, which may have 500 employees, their liability may be in the millions. But for a town like Antrim, there may be one employee in a given year. There is no big benefit to the town doing this.”
Town Administrator Scott Lester said as far as liability to the town, the pensions “are not something the town will ever actually have to pay.”
“When people retire, the pensions come from the state,” Lester said. “Antrim is not paying that.”
Dorr said the report is required by the Governmental Accounting and Standards Board, regardless of whether it is pertinent to the situation in a specific town.
“There is reporting that is part of a GASB standard, and when it’s not there, it becomes an ‘adverse’ rating,” she said.
Dorr said that the rating refers only to a specific section of the town’s financial reporting and will not impact the town’s credit rating or ability to secure a bond.
“I spoke to the New Hampshire Bond Bank specifically about this, and they said it would not be a problem. They don’t care,” Dorr said.
Select Board Chair Mike Ott said the town had received an “adverse” rating since 2018 and that it had not affected the ability to secure loans.
Antrim voters approved the town seeking a $1.2 bond for road repairs at the 2026 Town Meeting.
Dorr said of the 10 or 12 small towns for which she performs internal audits, “maybe two of them” choose to pay for an annual actuarial evaluation.
“Cities do them because they have a much larger pool of employees. The smaller towns just do not see the point of adding three or four thousand dollars to the budget for something that is just literally a number on a piece of paper. It’s not something you will ever have to pay or do anything with. It’s just for reporting purposes,” she said.
Former Town Clerk Donna Hanson said the town chose not to have the actuarial evaluation done after the requirement was instituted by GASB in 2018.
“We all talked about this in 2017 when we started to hear about it. We all talked to the Select Board. I talked to other towns who chose not to do it. At the time, I believe it was a lot more expensive, and it just wasn’t worth it,” Hanson said. “But this never affected our loans, it never affected our cash flow, and it never affected our budget. We didn’t have problems getting bonds, all these years.”
Dorr stressed that the “adverse” opinion was limited to just one part of the town’s financial reporting.
“When you look at your opinion, it breaks down all the opinion ratings, and it was only the ‘Governmental Activities’ section that received an adverse rating, because that piece of documentation was not there. Your general fund and all your major funds have an ‘unmodified’ opinion, which means everything is fairly represented,” Dorr said.
Antrim Treasurer Helene Newbold said that Town Clerk Annie Gilbert, who could not attend the meeting, had contacted surrounding towns that also had “adverse” ratings following inquiries from the public about the rating.
“Annie researched this issue, and she found that all these towns had the same ‘adverse’ rating for the exact same reason,” Newbold said.
Resident Frank Gorga said he had hoped the issue would be addressed at Town Meeting, but the meeting ended before it was discussed.
“It’s good that the town addressed it, and the meeting was worthwhile for the education of everyone involved,” Gorga stated.
Dorr encouraged anyone with further questions about the adverse rating to contact her through the Town of Antrim.