UND and NDSU Might Have Issues Similar to DSU

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Written By:
Brian Howell

May 9, 2012
12:32pm

A representative from the State Auditor’s Office told state lawmakers at the April 18, 2012 interim Higher Ed Committee meeting that similar financial issues discovered at Dickinson State University may also exist at the state’s two largest universities, UND and NDSU. “I guess I have to be careful here (with what I say) but I would tell you that we (The State Auditor’s Office) will have findings related to similar things that we found (at DSU) related to local monies,” said Gordy Smith, audit manager with the State Auditor’s Office.

While discussing the performance audit of Dickinson State University last month, Smith told members of the interim Higher Ed Committee that the State Auditor’s Office was conducting similar audits at UND and NDSU when auditors were called out to DSU around September 2011. “We were probably a little more than half done, maybe 2/3 done (with the audits at UND & NDSU), when we were asked to jump into this (DSU) audit. So we now have undertaken to finish that,” said Smith.

The State Auditor’s Office released the Dickinson State University performance audit at the end of March 2012. The audit identified numerous financial problems at the school, some which involved misuse of student fees. Now that the DSU situation has been identified, the State Auditor’s Office has turned its attention back to UND and NDSU.

“We think we’re (The State Auditor’s Office) going to finish the beginning objective of that. We think that’s going to be where we would have a draft report for those two universities (UND & NDSU) and the university system office by the end of May (2012). We hope by the end of June (2012) then we would have a final report that would detail that uses of those fees at those two major universities,” said Smith.

Smith was very cautious about how much information he revealed, but when asked if the fees he was referring to flowed into unrestricted funds, he did say that the fees identified, considered local monies, would be included in the schools’ unrestricted funds.