Audit report finds unsupported spending records in four Louisiana school systems
BATON ROUGE — A new state report found documentation problems and spending mismatches in financial information for several Louisiana public and charter school systems submitting to the Louisiana Department of Treasury
The Louisiana Legislative Auditor issued the report on Monday after reviewing information for July 1, 2024, through June 30, 2025. Treasury selected 10 school systems for the K-12 School Transparency Project., but only seven had approved financial information for the review.
Belle Chasse Academy, Orleans Parish and Tangipahoa Parish submitted financial information that the treasury had not approved, so the auditor did not perform procedures on those systems.
In expenditure testing, the report found East Baton Rouge Parish, JS Clark Leadership Academy, Lafayette Parish and Lycee Francais de la Nouvelle - Orleans did not have sufficient documentation for all selected expenditures.
The unsupported amounts were $74,995 across nine expenditures in East Baton Rouge, $7,239 across four expenditures at JS Clark, $4,077 in one expenditure in Lafayette and $3,282 across 13 expenditures at Lycee Francais.
The report also found East Baton Rouge Parish had 200 selected expenditures totaling $249,844 where the object codes and function codes were not consistent with Louisiana Accounting & Uniform Governmental Handbook requirements.
The auditor also found variances between annual budget data and expenditure data in Bossier Parish, East Baton Rouge Parish, Jefferson Parish, JS Clark Leadership Academy, Lafayette Parish, Lycee Francais de la Nouvelle - Orleans and St. Charles Parish.
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State law requires the Treasury to post financial information for each public school system on its website under Act No. 370 of the 2023 Regular Legislative Session—the report says school systems must send detailed spending data and contract information to the Treasury.