I'm with you on this one. I have nothing to hide with my accounting practices, but I would wonder what the "behind the scenes" catch is to all of it.
You don't mention if it's more than one PTO group, since you say "leaders, we", I'm thinking it might be. Could this be a matter of a problem with one group and they are putting the request to everyone so the "guilty" isn't aware it's their's that the district is interested in? Especially in today's "team" work society, the supervisor's have group meetings to address issues which only pertain to one or two. Unfortunately, those are the ones who are oblivious that the meeting was directed at them. The guy who's a few minutes late everyday. The coworker who takes a long lunch...
It does seem strange that they are asking for reconciled bank statements. :confused: If I gave them a copy of the bank statement - it wouldn't tell them much except for the deposits & withdrawls. It doesn't tell the story about what we really are doing and where the money will be going. Do they want a copy of the processed checks? So they can see who they were made out to? It does look like they just want your bottom line.
Question away and look at the reasoning behind what they are going to do with the information. As a non-profit we are obligated to give out some of that sort of information, but I'm not sure that the Bank Statement (reconciled or not) would fall under the FOIA.
Maybe you could send all of your forecasting, budgeting and expense reports all in a package with it. That way they realize you are on top of your organization.
We need to remember that many people out there seem to think the PTO is always a part of the school and if the PTO/PTA group name becomes mud, usually the district/school has it's name in the puddle with them.
We don't submit our bank statements to the district, but we do distribute our financial statements (Income/Expense, Net Worth, Expenses vs Budget) at every meeting, so they could easily have that info if they wanted it.
Do not distress. Please respond in writing and ask for all financial information for the district including salries for the top postions. As a taxpayer you are entitled to this information and it will fluster them engough that they will leave you alone.
We publish detailed reposts about our budget to the entire general membership so it is pretty well open to all. This keeps everyone focused on fund raiseng and answers the question, "What do you do with all our money?" Since we started this that has stoppena nd we seem to have more control on direction. They do not think we are working in secret and we have more people stepping up to volunteer and take leadership roles.
At a recent meeting of PTO leaders, we were told by the district that they are starting a new policy of requiring us to send them our reconciled bank statements every month. No mention of what would happen if we failed to comply. On one hand, I don't care because we have nothing to hide. On the other hand, this kind of bothers me. If we have our own EIN number and our own bank account, our finances are none of their business. They don't subsidize us--we subsidize them. And I'm concerned that this opens the door for them to, once they know how much money we have and how we spend it, to start dictating how we spend it. So you can see I am of two minds about this, and maybe I just need to squash the rabble rouser in me that always questions authority.
