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GM-12-09-05-039BROCKWAY GERSBACH FRANKLIN & NIEMEIER,P.C. CERTIFIED PUBLIC ACCOUNTANTS July 18,2012 Brushy Creek Regional Utility Authority, Inc. 221 E Main St Round Rock, Texas 78664 We are pleased to confinn our understanding of the services we are to provide Brushy Creek Regional Utility Authority, Inc. (the BCRUA) for the year ended September 30,2012. We will audit the financial statements of the business-type activities which comprise the basic financial statements of BCRUA as of and for the year ended September 30,2012. Accounting standards generally accepted in the United States of America provide for certain required supplementary information (RSI), such as management's discussion and analysis (MD&A), to supplement BCRUA's basic financial statements. Such information, although not a part of the basic financial statements, is required by the Governmental Accounting Standards Board who considers it to be an essential part of financial reporting for placing the basic financial statements in an appropriate operational, economic, or historical context. As part of our engagement, we will apply certain limited procedures to BCRUA's RSI in accordance with auditing standards generally accepted in the United States of America. These limited procedures will consist of inquiries of management regarding the methods of preparing the information and comparing the information for consistency with management's responses to our inquiries, the basic financial statements, and other knowledge we obtained during our audit of the basic financial statements. We will not express an opinion or provide any assurance on the information because the limited procedures do not provide us with sufficient evidence to express an opinion or provide any assurance. The following RSI is required by generally accepted accounting principles and will be subjected to certain limited procedures, but will not be audited: 1) Management's Discussion and Analysis 2) Budgetary Comparison Schedules Audit Objectives The objective of our audit is the expression of opinions as to whether your basic financial statements are fairly presented, in all material respects, in conformity with U.S. generally accepted accounting principles and to report on the fairness of the supplementary information referred to in the first paragraph when considered in relation to the financial statements taken as a whole. Our audit will be conducted in accordance with auditing standards generally accepted in the United States of America and the standards for financial audits contained in Government Auditing Standards, issued by the Comptroller General of the United States, and will include tests of the accounting records of BCRUA and other procedures we consider necessary to enable us to express such opinions. If our opinions on the financial statements are other than unqualified (unmodified), we will discuss the reasons with you in advance. If, for any reason, we are unable to complete the audit or are unable to form or have not formed opinions, we may decline to express opinions or to issue a report as a result of this engagement., 3520 SW H.K. DODGEN LOOP. TEMPLE, TEXAS 76504 .254.773.9907 • FAX 254.773.1570 WWW TEMPLECPA COM Brushy Creek Regional Utility Authority, Inc. Page Two We will also provide a report (that does not include an opinion) on internal control related to the financial statements and compliance with the provisions of laws, regulations, contracts and grant agreements, noncompliance with which ,could have a material effect on the financial statements as required by Government Auditing Standards. The report on internal control and compliance will include a statement that the report is intended solely for the information and use of management, the body or individuals charged with governance, others within the entity, and specific legislative or regulatory bodies and is not intended to be and should not be used by anyone other than these specified parties. If during our audit we become aware that BCRUA is subject to an audit requirement that is not. encompassed in the terms of this engagement, we will communicate to management and those charged with governance that an ~udit in accordance with U.S. generally accepted auditing standards and the standards for financial audits contained in Government Auditing Standards may not satisfy the relevant legal, regulatory, or contractual requirements. Management Responsibilities Management is responsible for the basic financial statements and all accompanying information as well as all representations contained therein. As part of the audit, we will assist with preparation of your financial statements and related notes. You are responsible for making all management decisions and performing all management functions relating to the financial statements and related notes and for accepting full responsibility for such decisions. You will be required to acknowledge in the written representation letter our assistance with preparation of the financial statements and that you have reviewed and approved the financial statements and related notes prior to their issuance and have accepted responsibility for them. Further, you are required to designate an individual with suitable skill, knowledge, or experience to oversee any nonaudit services we provide and for evaluating the adequacy and results of those services and accepting responsibility for them. Management is responsible for establishing and maintaining effective internal controls, including evaluating and monitoring ongoing activities, to help ensure that appropriate goals and objectives are met; for the selection and appiication of accounting principles; and for the fair presentation in the financial statements of the respective financial position of the business-type activities of the BCRUA and the respective changes in financial position and cash flows, where applicable, in conformity with U.S. generaI1y accepted accounting principles. Management is also responsible for making all financial records and related information available to us and for ensuring that management is reliable and financial information is reliable and properly recorded. You are also responsible for providing us with (1) access to all information, of which you are aware that is relevant to the preparation and fair presentation of the financial statements, (2) additional information that we may request for the purpose of the audit, and (3) unrestricted access to persons within the government from whom we determine it necessary to obtain audit evidence. Your responsibilities include adjusting the financial statements to correct material misstatements and for confirming to us in the written representation letter that the effects of any uncorrected misstatements aggregated by us during the current engagement and pertaining to the latest period presented are immaterial, ooth individually and in the aggregate, to the financial statements taken as a whole. Brushy Creek Regional Utility Authority, Inc. Page Three You are responsible for the design and implementation of programs and controls to prevent and detect fraud, and for infonning us about all known or suspected fraud affecting the government involving (I) management, (2) employees who have significant roles in internal control, and (3) others where the fraud or illegal acts could have a material effect on the financial statements. Your responsibilities include infonning us of your knowledge of any allegations of fraud or suspected fraud affecting the government received in communications from employees, fonner employees, grantors, regulators, or others. In addition, you are responsible for identifying and ensuring that the entity complies with applicable laws, regulations, contracts, agreements, and grants for taking timely and appropriate steps to remedy any fraud, illegal acts, violations of contracts or grant agreements, or abuse that we may report. You are responsible for the preparation of the supplementary infonnation in confonnity with U.S. generally accepted accounting principles. You agree to include our report on the supplementary infonnation in any document that cont~ins and indicates that we have reported on the supplementary infonnation. You also agree to present the supplementary infonnation with the audited financial statements. Your responsibilities include acknowledging to us in the written representation letter that (1) you are responsible for presentation of the supplementary infonnation in accordance with GAAP; (2) that you believe the supplementary infonnation, including its fonn and content, is fairly presented in accordance with GAAP; (3) that the methods of measurement or presentation have not changed from those used in the prior period (or, if they have changed, the reasons for such changes); and (4) you have disclosed to us any significant assumptions or interpretations underlying the measurement or presentation of the supplementary infonnation. Management is responsible for establishing and maintaining a process for tracking the status of audit findings and recommendations. Management is also responsible for identifying for us previous financial audits, attestation engagements, perfonnance audits or other studies related to the objectives discussed in the Audit Objectives section of this letter. This responsibility includes relaying to us corrective actions taken to address significant fmdings and recommendations resulting from those audits, attestation engagements, perfonnance audits, or other studies. You are also responsible for providing management's views on our current findings, conclusions, and recommendations, as well as your planned corrective actions, for the report, and for the timing and fonnat for providing that infonnation. Audit Procedures--General An audit includes examining, on a test basis, evidence supporting the amounts and disclosures in the financial statements; therefore, our audit will involve judgment about the number of transactions to be examined and the areas to be tested. An audit also includes evaluating the appropriateness of accounting policies used and the reasonableness of significant accounting estimates made by management, as well as evaluating the overall presentation of the financial statements. We will plan and perfonn the audit to obtain reasonable rather than absolute assurance about whether the financial statements are free of material misstatement, whether from (I) errors, (2) fraudulent financial reporting, (3) misappropriation of assets, or (4) violations of laws or governmental regulations that are attributable to the entity or to acts by management or employees acting on behalf of the entity. Because the detennination of abuse is subjective, Government Auditing Standards do not expect auditors to provide reasonable assurance of detecting abuse. Brushy Creek Regional Utility Authority, Inc. Page Four Because of the inherent limitations of an audit, combined with the inherent limitations of internal control, and because we will not perform a detailed examination of all transactions, there is a risk that material misstatements may exist and not be detected by us, even though the audit is properly planned and performed in accordance with U.S. generally accepted auditing standards and Government Auditing Standards. In addition, an audit is not designed to detect immaterial misstatements or violations of laws or governmental regulations that do not have a direct and material effect on the financial statements. However, we will inform the appropriate level of management of any material errors or any fraudulent financial reporting or misappropriation of assets that come to our attention. We will also inform the appropriate level of management of any violations of laws or governmental regulations that come to our attention, unless clearly inconsequential. Our responsibility as auditors is limited to the period covered by our audit and does not extend to any later periods for which we are not engaged as auditors. Our procedures will include tests of documentary evidence supporting the transactions recorded in the accounts, and may include tests of the physical existence of inventories, and direct confirmation of receivables and certain other assets and liabilities by correspondence with selected individuals, funding sources, creditors, and financial institutions. We will request written representations from your attorneys as part of the engagement, and they may bill you for responding to this inquiry. At the conclusion of our audit, we will require certain written representations from you about the financial statements and related matters. Audit Procedures-Internal Controls Our audit will include obtaining an understanding of the entity and its environment, including' internal control, sufficient to assess the risks of material misstatement of the financial statements and to design the nature, timing, and extent of further audit procedures. Tests of controls may be performed to test the effectiveness of certain controls that we consider relevant to preventing and detecting errors and fraud that are material to the financial statements and to preventing and detecting misstatements resulting from illegal acts and other noncompliance matters that have a direct and material effect on the fmancial statements. Our tests, if performed, will be less in scope than would be necessary to render an opinion on internal control and, accordingly, no opinion will be expressed in our report on internal control issued pursuant to Government Auditing Standards. An audit is not designed to provide assurance on internal control or to identify significant deficiencies. However, during the audit, we will communicate to management and those charged with governance internal control related matters that are required to be communicated under AICPA professional standards and Government Auditing Standards. Audit Procedures-Compliance As part of obtaining reasonable assurance about whether the financial statements are free of material misstatement, we will perform tests of BCRUA's compliance with the provisions of applicable laws, regulations, contracts, agreements, and grants. However, the objective of our audit will not be to provide an opinion on overall compliance and we will not express such an opinion in our report on compliance issued pursuant to Government Auditing Standards. Brushy Creek Regional Utility Authority, Inc. Page Five Engagement Administration, Fees, and Other We may from time to time, and depending on the circumstances, use third-party service providers in serving your account. We may share confidential infonnation about you with these service providers, but remain committed to maintaining the confidentiality and security of your information. Accordingly, we maintain internal policies, procedures, and safeguards to protect the confidentiality of your personal infonnation. In addition, we will secure confidentiality agreements with all service providers to maintain the confidentiality of your infonnation and we will take reasonable precautions to detennine that they have appropriate procedures in place to prevent the unauthorized release of your confidential infonnation to others. In the event that we are unable to secure an appropriate confidentiality agreement, you will be asked to provide your consent prior to the sharing of your confidential infonnation with the third-party service provider. Furthennore, we will remain responsible for the work provided by any such third-party service providers. We understand that your employees will prepare all cash or other confinnations we request and will locate any documents selected by us for testing. We will provide copies of our reports to BCRUA; however, management is responsible for distribution of the reports and the financial statements. Unless restricted by law or regulation, or containing privileged and confidential infonnation, copies of our reports are to be made available for public inspection. The audit documentation for this engagement is the property of Brockway, Gersbach, Franklin & Niemeier, P.C. and constitutes confidential infonnation. However, pursuant to authority given by law or regulation, we may be requested to make certain audit documentation available to a state or federal agency providing direct or indirect funding, or the U.S. Government Accountability Office for purposes of a quality review of the audit, to resolve audit findings, or to carry out oversight responsibilities. We will notify you of any such request. If requested, access to such audit documentation will be provided under the supervision of Brockway, Gersbach, Franklin & Niemeier, P.e. personnel. Furthennore, upon request, we may provide copies of selected audit documentation to the aforementioned parties. These parties may intend, or decide, to distribute the copies or infonnation contained therein to others, including other governmental agencies . . The audit documentation for this engagement will be retained for a minimum of five years after the report release date. If we are aware that a federal awarding agency or auditee is contesting an audit finding, we will contact the party(ies) contesting the audit finding for guidance prior to destroying the audit documentation. Brushy Creek Regional Utility Authority, Inc. Page Six We expect to begin our audit the first of November 2012 and to issue our reports in January 2013 based on being provided the items listed in the attached "List of Requested Items for Audit" on the dates promised as provided to us by Olivia Riley. Steve Niemeier is the engagement partner and is responsible for supervising the engagement and signing the reports or authorizing another individual to sign them. Steve will review all audit work papers and he will specifically review all major construction transactions and the related capitalization thereof. Our fee for these services will be at our standard hourly rates plus out-of-pocket costs (such as report reproduction, typing, postage, travel, copies, telephone, etc.) Our standard hourly rates vary according to the degree of responsibility involved and the experience level of the personnel assigned to your audit. Our invoices for these fees will be rendered each month as work progresses and are payable on presentation. In accordance with our firm policies, work may be suspended if your account becomes 30 days or more overdue and may not be resumed until your account is paid in full. If we elect to terminate our services for nonpayment, you will be obligated to compensate us for all time expended and to reimburse us for all out-of-pocket costs through the date of termination. Based on our preliminary estimates, the fees should not exceed $ 23,S~0 plus out-of-pocket expense. The above fee is based on anticipated cooperation from your personnel and the assumption that unexpected circumstances will not be encountered during the audit. Specifically, this fee is contingent upon your personnel meeting the timeline which they have provided us and as documented in the attachment. Please review the attachment carefully, since this time line is imperative to meeting the reporting deadlines of your participating cities and will result in additional audit fees. If significant additional time is necessary, we will discuss it with you and arrive at a new fee estimate before we incur the additional costs. Government Auditing Standards require that we provide you with a copy of our most recent external peer review report and any Jetter of comment, and any subsequent peer review reports and letters of comment received during the period of the contract. Our 2009 peer review accompanies this Jetter. We appreciate the opportunity to be of service to BCRUA and believe this letter accurately summarizes the significant terms of our engagement. If you have any questions, please let us know. If you agree with the terms of our engagement as described in this letter, please sign the enclosed copy and return it to us. Sincerely, <-'il.~f(1/~ lku Brockw~':Ch,FrL~ & Niemeier, P.C. RESPONSE: This Jetter correctly sets forth the understanding of Brushy Creek Regional Utility Authority, Inc. 1Name C;~V1-e ('.s: ( Ma. V1~y:e Title Date , t , ~ BCRUA List of Requested Items for Audit For the Year Ended September 30, 2012 Requested Engagement letter Signed bank &debt confirmations Draft compiled financial statements as of 9.30.12 Final compiled financial statements as of9.30.12 Promised by 08.01.2012 10.15.2012 11.05.2012 11.16.2012 QuickBooks file 11.09.2012 Access to Share Point site (use rna me &password) List of any new bank/investment accounts with account numbers Bilnk/investment account reconciliations as of9.30.12 Bank/investment account statements (with images of cleared items) for October 2011 -September 2012 Original and final amended budget for FY12 Capitalized interest schedule Bond interest accrual schedule 09.01.2012 10.01.2012 11.05.2012 11.16.2012 11.09.2012 11.09.2012 11.09.2012 Master schedule of final cost allocation percentages by phase and project line item in effect for FY 2012 Due to cities schedule Depreciation schedules for new assets or assets moved out of CIP, if applicable Schedule of any additional equity contributions made by cities, if applicable Copies of any minutes, new resolutions, contracts, contract amendments, leases, policies, etc. not available through Share Point or website 11.05.2012 11.09.2012 11.09.2012 11.09.2012 11.09.2012 Copies of release of funds requests for TWDB funds with backup documentation #6-? 11.09.2012 Detail accounts payable/receivable listing 11.09.2012 Bank/investment account statements (with images of cleared items) for October 2011 11.23.2012 MD&A revisions/additions 12.21.2012 Bank/investment account statements (with images of cleared items) for November 2011 12.21.2012 Carneiro, Chumney&"'Co., L.c. Robert M. McAdams, CPA CERTIFIED PUBLIC ACCOUNTANTS Allen E. Robertson, Jr., CPA Paul Roth-Roffy, CPA Edward H. Guerra, CPA Julia C. Norton, CPA Michael J. Schaub, CPA System Review Report September 22,2009 To the Shareholders of Brockway Gersbach Franklin &Niemeier PC and the Peer Review Committee of the Texas Society of CPAs We have reviewed the system of quality control for the accounting and aUditing practice of Brockway Gersbach Franklin & Niemeier PC (the firm) in effect for the year ended April 30, 2009. Our peer review was conducted in accordance with the Standards for Performing and Reporting on Peer Reviews established by the Peer Review Board of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants. The firm is responsible for designing a system of quality control and complying with it to provide the firm with reasonable assurance of performing and reporting in conformity with applicable professional standards in all material respects. Our responsibility is to express an opinion on the design of the system of quality control and the firm's compliance therewith based on our review. The nature, objectives, scope, limitations of, and the procedures performed in a System Review are described in the standards at www.aicpa.org/prsummary. As required by the standards, engagements selected for review included (engagements performed under the Government Auditing Standards and audits of employee benefit plans. In our opinion, the system of quality control for the accounting and auditing practice of Brockway Gersbach Franklin &Niemeier PC, in effect for the year ended April 30, 2009, has been suitably designed and complied with to provide the firm with reasonable assurance of performing and reporting in conformity with applicable professional standards in all material respects. Firms can receive a rating of pass, pass with deficiency(ies) or fail. Brockway Gersbach Franklin & Niemeier PC has received a peer review rating of pass. "Helping Clients Succeed for more than 75 Years" 40 N.L Loop 410, SUite 200' San Antonio, Texas 78216-5876 (210) 342-8000 • Fax (210) 342-0866 E.-mail: carneiro@carneiro.com • www.carneiro.com An Independent Member of the BOO Seidman Alliance