City Council Meeting Summary

• The meeting focused on audit planning for the City of Richmond Hill, discussion of new accounting standards and materiality in audits, and confirmations of related motions. Public input opportunities were noted mainly through post-meeting inquiries, and several motions related to agenda adoption and audit reporting were approved.

Five most important topics discussed

1) Audit Strategy for Year Ending December 31, 2025 - KPMG outlined the audit planning for the city’s consolidated financial statements, including how materiality and risk drive sample selection and focus areas. Quote: “This is the number that we calculate to scope our audit engagement, to pick sample sizes, to determine which accounts we want to focus more on, and to assess the risk related to those accounts.” Public impact: ensures the audit focuses on significant areas that could affect residents’ understanding of city finances.

2) Materiality and the AMT threshold - The discussion emphasized how materiality guides audit conclusions and the threshold used for misstatements. Quote: “At the end of the audit, this number becomes important again because if there are any corrected or uncorrected adjustments, we look at this number and say, are the uncorrected adjustments higher than materiality?” The group also noted the group audit misstatement posting threshold (AMT) of $490,000. Public impact: determines whether errors would require reporting, affecting the integrity of financial statements residents rely on.

3) Involvement of actuarial specialists and employee future benefits liabilities - Actuarial input is used to assess liabilities connected to employee benefits, with consistency from prior years. Quote: “This is consistent with prior year. There's no change here.” Public impact: affects long-term city liabilities and pension/benefit reporting that residents may notice in budgets and benefit services.

4) Fraud risk and management override considerations - The audit framework recognizes management override as a universal risk in audits, with ongoing assurances about past performance. Quote: “Canadian auditing standards require us to assume that this risk exists in all our audit engagements... In the past, we've never had an issue.” Public impact: helps residents trust that internal controls are evaluated, though it’s more of an audit process detail than a direct service change.

5) Scoping of audits and separate audits for Library and BIA - The scope includes ensuring significant entities are audited and confirms separate financial statement audits for the library and the BIA at a lower materiality level. Quotes: “If we don't do those smaller audits, we can still issue our opinion on the consolidated level.” And, “We do complete separate financial statement audits for the library and the BIA.” Public impact: enhances accountability for key local services (library) and community initiatives (BIA) that residents interact with.

Opportunities for Public Input - Public delegations were not scheduled for this meeting, but comments related to required inquiries could be submitted afterward. Quote: “If there are any comments... please feel free to reach out to me. My contact information is on the second page of this report.” For ongoing accessibility, residents should use the presenter’s listed contact information in the report for feedback.

File numbers or bylaw numbers discussed - No specific file numbers or bylaw numbers were mentioned in the transcript excerpts provided.

Motions and outcomes

1) Motion to Adopt the Agenda - Outcome: Passed unanimously.

2) Motion to Approve the Audit Planning Report Presentation - Outcome: Not explicitly stated in the transcript, but the presentation proceeded without objection (implied approval).

3) Motion to Receive the Audit Report - Outcome: Passed unanimously.

4) Motion to Approve the Capital Project Financial Status Report - Outcome: Passed unanimously.

5) Adjournment - Outcome: Passed unanimously.

Councillors present - Mayor (name not provided in the excerpts) - Councillor Scott Thompson (in person) - Regional Local Councillor DePollo (participated virtually)

Note: The transcripts reference a chair/meeting facilitator and various staff/consultants, but the explicit list of all councillors present beyond Thompson and DePollo is not fully specified in the provided material.