Jay Curtis

Park County School District 1 once again received a clean audit, which Superintendent Jay Curtis at the Jan. 13 board meeting credited to longtime Business Services Coordinator Mary Jo Lewis and her staff, joking that she’d likely have a stroke if something were to be found out of place in the yearly audit. 

The audit report was once again presented by Cindy Kretzer of Porter, Muirhead, Cornea and Howard, who praised Lewis and her staff for their support of her and of running a tight ship with the financials. 

“You’re a great example I can use a lot of places, Kretzer said, noting that she uses Park 1 to help her new employees learn what a district is supposed to be doing. 

She audited the 2024-2025 school year financials, which ended with the district having 65 days worth of reserves, which she said is a good amount. 

One change from the past few years was in the single audit of a federal fund. Recently the ESSER program was audited as it had funding of over $750,000, making it a requirement to be audited, but the line has now been raised to $1 million, and Kretzer said that as no grant reached that threshold, they could be more flexible with the single audit, this year auditing child nutrition. 

This year’s audit report and past years can be found at pcsd1.org/documents/departments/business-office/financials.

Curtis contract extended

Curtis is slated to continue leading Park 1 until at least the summer of 2028. 

At the first board meeting of the year Jan. 13 trustees, after an executive session, unanimously approved extending Curtis’ contract, which had run through June 30, 2027, to June 30, 2028. 

It’s the same action they’ve taken each of the last few years.

Compensation will be determined at a later date. 

After the decision a number of board members thanked Curtis for his service. He’s been the superintendent since 2017, when he moved to Powell from Meeteetse. 

“Thank you to the board,” Curtis said. “There’s no place I’d rather be doing it.”