The city of Natchez has received its first clean audit report in two decades, no simple feat considering just last year the report found a number of problems with internal controls of the city’s books.

While previous audit problems pointed not to mismangement of funds but simply to bad accounting practices, the current audit shows that many of those problems have been corrected.

For example, last year auditors from Gillon and Co. directed the city to keep better track of its fixed assets, place better internal controls on disbursements and better record cash accounts.

None of those problems pointed to any deliberate wrongdoing &045;&045; but they were problems that needed to be corrected in order to keep the books clean.

Kudos to the city clerk’s office and to the mayor and board of aldermen for making sure those changes have been made and that they continue to be upheld.

We encourage the city to continue the high standards this audit now sets for the city clerk’s office.

There was two problems noted in this year’s audit: the municipal court clerk’s office was not making daily deposits and administrative costs coming from grant funds weren’t documented in accordance with federal standards. But those have been corrected as well.

Keeping track of the city’s money means keeping track of taxpayers’ money &045;&045; and we need the best practices to make sure everything is handled correctly.