Photos submitted: The Ashville Fire Department, located in Stow.

STOW – An audit from State Comptroller Tom DiNapoli’s office recently found some errors in the way in which the Ashville Fire District went about purchasing equipment.

The audit pointed out procedures that were not done in compliance with state regulations, and offers a total of 11 recommendations. District officials noted the steps that are already being put in place, as well as the corrective actions that are being taken where possible.

The audit was performed over the period from Jan. 1, 2024 to May 28, 2025, with the research extending back to August 2021 to cover purchases that were still being paid on within the audit period. The purpose of the audit was to determine if the district’s Board of Commissioners had completed the purchase in full compliance with state law and if proper oversight on the purchases was provided. After the completion of the audit, DiNapoli’s office found that the board did not demonstrate that the purchases were completed within the parameters of state law, and that proper oversight of the purchases was also not shown.

One of these bidding instances was for a custom pumper, which occurred back in September 2021. At this time, the board awarded a bid which totaled $407,700. However, the district would end up paying the vendor about $63,500 more than this due to 43 change orders that were not included in the original bid specifications. The board would approve 42 of these 43 change orders in January 2024, after the vendor had made the modifications and had the product ready to ship.

“One of the change orders the Chairman approved was for a $6,700 vendor surcharge that increased the price due to pandemic-related supply shortages Despite pressure to pay the additional surcharge, the district was under no contractual obligation to pay this additional amount due to supply shortages Therefore, the additional payment (i e , surcharge) was an unnecessary expense and unfair to the other bidders who were unaware that the contract included an opportunity to adjust prices based on market conditions,” said the Comptroller’s audit.

The Comptroller’s Office took issue with recent truck purchases made by the district as well, including a mini-pumper totaling about $325,000. The company possessed this truck after another department had put in a cancellation order. The vendor valued the truck at about $390,000, but fire officials were unable to provide examples of due diligence when determining if the offer was fair. Additionally, the only bid that was received was from the vendor that offered this sale. While the bid specification noted that a delivery timeframe had to be listed, the district’s legal notice requested availability “for immediate delivery” The audit stated that this could have unfairly limited other vendors from bidding, as the trucks are typically manufactured after they are ordered.

The audit also found that the board did not perform proper oversight for multiple payments, which resulted in the district overpaying about $6,500. The first instance of this occurred in October, 2021. At this time the chairman has signed a vendor agreement for a new pumper, which would include a total of $5,200 of discounts if the district complied with specific delivery and down payment options. While the board complied with these options, an error caused them to not be applied. The board ended up paying the bill without first properly auditing the itemized breakdown, and before even receiving it. The second instance occurred in September, 2022, about when the downpayment was being made for the pumper. In this case, the total paid between the down payment and the lease-purchase agreement was $1,300 more than the bid award.

Additionally, the audit found that the district’s purchasing policy has not been updated recently enough, and therefore is out of compliance with state law. Specifically, the board purchasing policy included procedures for contracts under $10,000 and public works contracts under $20,000, and noted that any amount in excess of these will be subject to NYS regulations. Currently, these thresholds should have been higher, hence the push to update this policy.

Dave Foster, Current commissioners board trustee, and previous chair, spoke on the audit, and detailed how the district plans to correct these mistakes. Foster first noted that the purchasing policy will be updated in the first quarter of this year. Foster also spoke on the overpayments that were made by the district.

“They give you some incentives that they’re supposed to discount you on. And those things were missed by our board, and our treasurer, and then secretary,” said Foster. “When they say there wasn’t enough oversight, in all cases, we weren’t reconciling to the best degree that we could when payments were made.”

Foster stated that, though problems have occurred with the recent large purchases, any large purchase is reviewed to ensure the most complete specifications possible are made. Foster then noted that the board will need to thoroughly discuss and approve any changes after the order. Lastly, Foster noted that the department will take greater care in the final review of invoices and finalized bills, to ensure that only the proper charges are listed and paid on.

“From the beginning we were in full support of the audit process, and we did our best to answer the questions the best we can,” said Foster. “We feel confident that, for the next project that would come along, that we would have better oversight, and just better communication and reconciling.”