Interrelationship of Monthly ARRA Expenditure Reports and MEDMS

INFORMATIONAL LETTER: 62
POLICY CODE: FDA

TO: Superintendents of Schools, Business Managers
FROM: Angela Faherty, Ph.D., Commissioner of Education
DATE: January 21, 2011
RE: Interrelationship of Monthly ARRA Expenditure Reports and MEDMS

In anticipation of the impending date that the Federal authorization of ARRA Stabilization funds is set to expire, the School Finance Coordinator in the Department of Education did a cumulative comparison between the statewide total of Fund 020 and/or Fund 0200 expenditures that have been uploaded to MEDMS Financial to the cumulative statewide total ARRA Stabilization fund expenditures reported in MEDMS ARRA. The statewide total expenditures in MEDMS Financial are greater than the total reported to MEDMS ARRA by a significant amount.

As the Department issues Stabilization payments based on the data in MEDMS ARRA, not MEDMS Financial, the School Finance Coordinator would encourage everyone to reconcile these two data sets back to your accounting system and make any necessary updates so that all three systems reconcile. Remember, Stabilization money cannot be carried to FY 2012 – it must be spent for FY 2011 obligations. The Department will have a limited amount of time after the close of FY 2011 to draw down funds.

There are reports available in the MEDMS Reporting Portal that can aid in reconciliation to that system. To access these reports sign into MEDMS and choose Reports in the Application menu and Portal in the Action menu. Once in the portal, the first menu choice is ARRA Data Collection; the first two links in that folder will be the most useful to you. If you need assistance with the MEDMS ARRA data, please contact Ted Fournier at edward.fournier@maine.gov .

For reconciliation to MEDMS Financial, sign into MEDMS Financial and choose Reports in the menu and Expenditure by SAU in the sub menu. Once there, choose Detailed under Report Style, choose the fiscal year to which you want to gather data (you will need to run the report for three separate fiscal years - 2009, 2010 and 2011 as remember, the Department looks at cumulative data when calculating your monthly reimbursement), choose Excel in the report format and then hit “show report”. This will download all transactions but as it is in Excel, you can filter by fund to obtain only Stabilization fund transactions. If you need assistance with the MEDMS Financial data, please contact me.

Again, all three systems should match cumulatively (a month by month match is not necessary as this program is cumulative). If they do not, you will need to determine why and correct the issue in the pertinent system. Our Federal partners are performing significant monitoring of this program. The Inspector General’s Office may request verification that what is stated in MEDMS ARRA is accurate. Additionally, if you put off the reconciliation for too long and the corrections are complex, you could potentially miss the deadline for drawing funds.

As a reminder, Stabilization funds are issued on a reimbursement model – if you don’t spend it, you don’t receive it. The MEDMS ARRA reporting module is the system from which data is drawn for the check run so, if the transaction isn’t in the ARRA Reporting module, we cannot issue a check against it. Additionally, funds are only issued to those units that are in good financial standing with the Department, meaning your subsidy is not being held for a missing report and you are in compliance with cash management. If you have been notified that there is a problem with your cash management report and it is not corrected by the monthly Stabilization check run, a Stabilization check will not be issued.

If you have questions please contact Joanne Allen, School Finance Coordinator Maine Department of Education, at 207-624-6790 or via email at joanne.allen@maine.gov .