Senior Accountant

general description

the city of hamilton is an eeo & aae. Minorities and women are encouraged to apply.

this is difficult, technical and complex professional accounting and administrative work involving the application of accounting principles and auditing practices, including the maintenance, adjustment and reporting of financial and other related records for selected municipal finance and accounting activities and supervision of subordinates as assigned. Activities require practical and acquired knowledge of the city’s accounting practices, focusing on the overall accounting, payroll and tax-reporting regimen of the finance department.

Duties are carried out under the supervision of the assistant finance director but extensive leeway is granted for the exercise of independent judgment and initiative. The nature of the work performed requires that an employee in this class maintain cooperative working relationships with both internal and external customers, as well as other members of the finance department staff.

• compiles data and prepares a variety of financial and statistical reports.
• reviews, compiles and understands tax reporting to the extent that 1099 and payroll tax reporting can be generated, and the liabilities paid, on a timely basis.
• prepares schedules for use by, provides assistance to, answers questions of, and retrieves records or supplies information to both finance department staff and external auditors during the audit process.
• provides internal auditing for the proper payment and coding of expenditures, including the review of accounts payable and revenues received post year-end.
• assists in budget preparation.
• initiates adjusting/correcting entries and postings thereof as necessary and coordinates completion of monthly duties with other finance department staff, particularly other senior level staff, to enable timely issuance of monthly financial report to city council.
• prepares requisitions, purchase orders, check requests and initiates payment for certain assigned expenditures.
• can coordinate and maintain positive pay system for checks issued by the finance department staff.
• reconciles bank account(s) as required and assigned by comptroller.
• reconciles and maintains trust account(s), balances investments, transfers monies between accounts for both debt service & capital draws and insures accurate posting of investment income/expenditure posting, as required and assigned by comptroller.
• coordinates contractual reimbursements to the city, providing reconciliation and invoicing of those activities and provides information to comptroller of unordinary delays in the process, including late payment of those invoices.
• performs account reconciliations and related analysis.
• reviews, verifies and authorizes transactions and accounting classifications assigned to various records.
• participates in the year-end closing process.
• maintains and implements internal controls on both physical and theoretical levels to insure the safeguarding of assets to the extent that benefits do not outweigh the costs of the controls.
• ensures that accounting systems are operating correctly, correcting errant entries and investigating and resolving problems that may occur.
• works with finance management and staff to develop and implement accounting systems and procedural improvements.
• compiles data and prepares a variety of internal and external daily, monthly, quarterly and annual financial and statistical reports.
• reviews weekly summary of fund based activity and offers comments & correction.
• attends meetings, conferences and workshops as requested and authorized.
• reconciles bank accounts with treasurer’s reports.
• performs other related duties as required or assigned by finance management.

• reconciles treasury investment pool and provides recommendations and oversight to the purchase and selling of those investments as well as the proper monthly or quarterly distribution of investment earnings to segregated funds of the city.
• prepares monthly budgetary proprietary financial statements for utility department management, including the deputy city manager or his/her successor, and…