School Fund and the Road Fund, are maintained primarily for audit purposes, though they may have informational value. The State's relations with counties are very complicated. Reports rendered by county officials to the State are of a character similar to "accounts current" and must be audited before acceptance. For this purpose continuous records must be maintained for each county official and for each of several classes of receipts and expenditures. For the School Fund and the Road Fund county records are obviously necessary.

The records so maintained do not bear the relation of accounts subsidiary to the general ledger. They do, nevertheless, contain, in one form or another, information which would make possible a distribution by counties of some of the revenues and expenditure items posted to the general ledger, and in some cases they give a further analysis according to the nature of receipts or expenditures than that shown by the general books of accounts. This information is not now integrated with that of the general ledger in the preparation of statements of revenues and expenditures or of assets and liabilities. In fact, it serves practically no purpose other than that of settlements with county officers.

As has been indicated above, the financial relations of the State to its counties are needlessly complicated. This large portion of the work of the Auditor's office could be almost entirely eliminated by a few changes in the law and apparently without disadvantage to the taxpayers. In the annual report of the Auditor for the year ending June 30, 1921, fifty-five out of eighty pages are taken up with figures representing accounts of local officials with the State.

The claim desks are those which receive expenditure vouchers of department and institutions and, after approval, draw warrants for their payment. When received at the Auditor's office individual bills and receipts are listed on voucher forms. Sometimes the bills and receipts are marked as approved by the heads of departments and institutions, but this is not uniformly

passes from one House to the other). It is proposed, therefore, that the Budget Officer be required by law to work for the chairman of the two appropriation committees while the Appropriation Act is under consideration. This practice is in accordance with well established procedure in Massachusetts, South Carolina, and other states.

In another report it is proposed that this officer be given the general supervisory responsiblities over county fiscal affairs which it is believed some State officer must have. The responsibilities of the State officers should not be such as to give him direct administrative authority over the counties. On the other hand, they are in a considerable measure those of a fiscal officer who is responsible for seeing that the law is carried out in each county and that proper standards in handling financial affairs are maintained. The most difficult technical problems to be dealt with are those in connection with the approval of the county budgets and for this reason the Budget Officer is particularly well fitted to handle such work.

in order that the Treasurer's books may be kept in agreement with the Auditor's, no means having been devised by the two offices for making these corrections without using warrants and checks. The true revenues and expenditures of the State are, therefore, not shown in the receipts and warrant registers kept by the Bookkeeper, nor are they shown anywhere else.

The receipts which come to the Bookkeeper have noted on them only sufficient information to enable him to credit the proper funds, or, in some cases, the proper expenditure accounts. Some of these receipts are not divided between funds. but go entirely to the credit of special funds. In such cases, the receipts indicate only the funds to be credited and not the nature of the revenue, the amount shown on the receipts sometimes being the total of a number of items of different kinds of receipts but lumped together because they affect only one fund. The procedure does not conform to the law or to good accounting practice.

Receipts for revenues divisible among several funds indicate the character of the revenues and the Bookkeeper makes the distribution between funds by applying the formulas prescribed. These distributions between funds are in the case of certain revenues made daily, and in the case of certain others made monthly, but in either case there is only one computation with no independent check or proof and as a result occasional errors go through which are never corrected. As an illustration the amount credited to the Common School Fund for the year ending June 30, 1923, was less than it should be by the sum of $1,580.91 and the Road Fund, for a similar reason, was short $921.29.

Warrants bear notations indicating the funds or the expenditure accounts to be charged. The only fund for which detailed expenditure accounts are kept is the General Fund and the expenditure accounts of this fund correspond to appropriations.

The journal is used for a certain few transfers between

After the letting of the contracts, the Board of Printing Commissioners exercises control over the major printing items by determining, first, whether the matter may be printed, and second, if it may be, in what quantities.

It then becomes the function of the Superintendent of Public Printing to issue a written order to the printing contractor with instructions concerning the execution of the job, to make a record of the item, to report monthly to the Board the amount of printing used by each department, and to compare all invoices for printing with the prices agreed upon.

Offices:

The only space occupied by this unit is the small office and alcove on the third floor of the new capitol, comprising approximately two hundred and ninety square feet.

Organization:

Aside from the officers mentioned, no further organization is provided, except that during intervals between the Board's meetings the Assistant Auditor of Public Accounts acts in its stead and exercises its powers with reference to minor items, referring back to the Board any matters in which he may be in doubt. During the legislative sessions the Superintendent is furnished with temporary assistance.

Expenditures and Revenues:

During the fiscal year ending June 30, 1923, the following expenditures were incurred:

The costs of printing incurred under the first class, and for printing and paper under the third class, contracts are