From Staff Reports
When it comes to responsible accounting and providing clear, informative financial reports, the town is again among the best in the nation. Two awards given to the town recently back those claims.
This marks the 13th year in a row Apple Valley has earned a Certificate of Achievement for Excellence in Financial Reporting and the second consecutive year it has earned the Distinguished Budget Presentation Award from the Government Finance Officers Association of the United States and Canada.
“Receipt of these awards again serves to underscore the Town’s commitment to excellence in public service, complete transparency in our operations and accountability to the public,” said Marc Puckett, Assistant Town Manager of Finance and Administration.
The CAFER award is granted to government agencies meeting the high standards of the awards program. Only the top 4.5 percent of the nation and top 10.6 percent of California government agencies achieve this honor. It's the highest form of recognition in the area of governmental accounting and financial reporting, and represents a significant accomplishment by a government and its management. Nationwide, there are 90,056 government agencies eligible for the award. Of those, 4,113 received the award. In California, only 481 of the 4,541 eligible local government agencies received the award.
The CAFER was judged by an impartial panel to meet the high standards of the program including demonstrating a constructive "spirit of full disclosure" to clearly communicate its financial story and motivate potential users and user groups to read the document.
The Distinguished Budget Presentation Award is granted by the GFOA to government agencies that prepare budget documents of the very highest quality and reflect the guidelines established by the National Advisory Council on State and Local Budgeting and the GFOA’s best practices on budgeting for effective budget presentations. Only the top 1.6 percent (1,433) of the nation and top 3.9 percent (175) of California government agencies received this award. These guidelines assess how well an entity’s budget serves as a policy document, a financial plan, an operations guide and a communications device. Budget documents must be rated as proficient in all four of these categories as well as fourteen mandatory criteria within those categories to receive the award.
Only 1.1 percent of the 90,056 government agencies in the nation received both awards. The Government Finance Officers Association is a nonprofit professional association serving approximately 17,500 government finance professionals with offices in Chicago and Washington, D.C.
Eligible government agencies consists of states, counties, special districts, cities, villages, townships, school districts, colleges and universities.