Key Points
- Wilton officials acknowledge the town will miss the Jun. 30 deadline for completing its state-required audit.
- The reconciliation of key financial accounts remains unfinished, and officials could not provide a timeline for completion.
- Wilton’s bond advisor said the town’s credit rating should remain strong if the audit is completed before the end of the year.
Why It Matters: The delayed audit raises ongoing questions about the town’s financial reporting process and the costly reconciliation effort, while affecting Wilton’s ability to issue new bonds until the audit is completed.
Wilton will now miss the June 30 deadline for completion of the state-mandated audit as the reconciliation of key financial accounts — including the town’s general fund for Fiscal Year 2025 — remains unfinished.
Despite months of assurances that the outstanding financial work would be completed through the efforts of Finance Department consultant Joseph Centofanti, who was brought on as interim chief financial officer last August, Wilton CFO Dawn Savo is now saying she cannot say for sure when the work will finally be done.
“It’s a work in progress,” Savo told the Board of Finance on Tuesday, Jun. 9, noting that she continues to meet regularly with both Centofanti’s firm, PKF O’Connor Davies, and representatives from CliftonLarsonAllen LLP, the company conducting the audit.
Asked when Centofanti’s reconciliation work might finally be completed, Savo said, “Since I’m not personally doing it I don’t want to speculate on that date.”
According to BOF Chair Tim Birch, CLA principal Leslie Zoll — who is again leading Wilton’s audit — told him that the reconciliation of the town’s general fund remains incomplete, preventing auditors from completing their work.
“I had a conversation with her yesterday … She told me a few things. Number one is that the reconciliation of general funds has not been completed. Until that is completed she cannot conduct her audit in the fashion necessary,” Birch said.
State Unlikely to Penalize Town for Missing Deadline
Regarding the ramifications of missing the Jun. 30 deadline, Birch said Zoll told him that the state is unlikely to take any action against Wilton.
“I’ll use her words: Since Covid, the number of towns that have not made the Jun. 30 deadline has been pretty large,” he told fellow board members.
According to Birch, Zoll said she has 12 municipal clients that will miss the Jun. 30 deadline this year and that some municipalities have yet to complete their 2024 audits.
He said she added an extra bit of assurance, telling him, “The municipal authority that governs this is so backed up.”
Consequently, Zoll told Birch that it was unlikely the state would take any action provided the town remains in communication with the state and continues providing status updates at least every two weeks.
Savo also said she didn’t believe there would be meaningful ramifications from the state for missing the audit.
“So far they’re approved all of our extensions … We are meeting regularly with PKF and CLA,” Savo said.
Questions Continue Over Consultant’s Role and Cost
For months, members of both the BOF and the Board of Selectmen have expressed their strong frustrations and concerns over the lack of public updates and seeming absence of Centofanti, who has declined repeated requests by both boards to attend their meetings and discuss his progress on reconciliation efforts.
Savo and First Selectman Toni Boucher have continued to defend Centofanti, maintaining that because he is now serving as an accounting consultant rather than interim CFO, he is not obligated to respond to the boards’ requests to appear before them or provide them with updates directly.
Board members, however, have disagreed, noting that as a consultant being paid $375 an hour by the town, Centofanti should be more responsive to elected officials.
While all complete invoices were not available from the town, records show that from September 2025 through April 2026, Centofanti has billed the town approximately $215,000, with an additional roughly $12,000 or so billed by members of his team. Some elected officials have estimated that Centofanti’s final charges could exceed $300,000 before his work is complete.
Birch, who has previously voiced disappointment with Centofanti’s failure to respond to his direct communication, recently described the prospect of Wilton missing the state’s audit deadline as an embarrassment for the town.
Bond Advisor Says Credit Rating Should Remain Strong
Although the worst-case scenario of missing the audit deadline as far as the state was concerned appeared to be at most paying a fine and meeting regularly with state officials to provide updates, town officials have also raised concerns about how the failure to meet the deadline might impact the town’s financial standing and its Aaa bond rating from Moody’s in particular.
On Tuesday, the BOF also heard from its bond advisor, Phoenix Advisors Managing Director Barry Bernabe, who answered a series of questions about the potential impact of Wilton failing to meet the audit deadline on the town’s bond rating and ability to borrow.
Bernabe noted that several other Connecticut municipalities, including five that share Wilton’s Aaa rating, have also thus far failed to complete their 2025 audits.
Bernabe was less concerned about the Jun. 30 deadline, but emphasized the importance of having the audit done before the end of December.
“It’s the policy of Moody’s that they give municipalities a year and a half,” Bernabe said.
He noted that the town’s credit position is still currently “very, very strong.”
However, he cautioned that should the town not complete the audit by the end of December, Moody’s would completely withdraw the rating attached to Wilton’s outstanding bonds.
In the meantime, Wilton can continue using the rating issued in June 2025 for bond issuances through the end of this month. After Jun. 30, however, the town will be unable to issue new bonds until the Fiscal Year 2025 audit is completed and a new rating is issued.
“We will not be able to issue new bonds until that audit is released,” Bernabe said.
The bond issuing process, he said, typically takes about two to three months from start to finish.
I am trying to break this down plainly, because I think many residents may read “Wilton missed the audit deadline” and not immediately understand why this matters.
From what I understand, there are several separate issues happening at once.
First: Wilton is going to miss the June 30 deadline for completing its state-required FY2025 audit.
That alone matters, but it is not the whole issue.
Second: the audit cannot be completed because key financial reconciliations are still unfinished, including the general fund.
In plain English, reconciliation means making sure the town’s financial records match the underlying bank and accounting records. Until that is done, the auditors cannot complete the audit properly.
So the issue is not simply, “The audit is late.”
The issue is: the basic financial cleanup work needed before the audit can move forward still is not done.
Third: town officials still cannot say when the work will be complete.
That is the part that concerns me most. According to the article, CFO Dawn Savo said she did not want to speculate on when the reconciliation work would be completed because she is not personally doing it.
I understand not wanting to guess. But from a governance standpoint, that answer raises a much bigger question.
If the CFO cannot give a completion date because the consultant is doing the reconciliation, and the consultant does not have to appear publicly because he is now being treated as a consultant rather than interim CFO, then residents are right to ask where accountability sits.
Who is responsible for final delivery?
Fourth: the consultant issue matters.
Joseph Centofanti was brought in after the town’s finance problems and Munis conversion issues. According to GMW, he has already billed about $215,000 from September through April, plus additional billing from his team, and some officials estimate the final cost could exceed $300,000.
To put the hourly rate in perspective: at $375/hour, that equals $3,000 for an 8-hour day, $15,000 for a 40-hour week, and $60,000 for a four-week month. If someone billed that rate full-time for a year, it would equal $780,000.
I am not saying he is billing full-time or being paid that annually. I am saying the rate and total public cost are high enough that residents deserve a clear explanation of what has been completed for that money.
Fifth: the “state probably will not penalize us” point should not end the conversation.
The article says the state is unlikely to take major action if Wilton keeps communicating and providing updates. But that only addresses one kind of consequence: state enforcement.
It does not address the separate financial consequence described later in the article, which is that after June 30, Wilton will not be able to issue new bonds until the FY2025 audit is completed and a new rating is issued.
So even if the state does not penalize Wilton, the unfinished audit still has practical consequences for the town’s ability to borrow for capital projects.
Sixth: the public accountability structure appears functionally broken.
If the CFO cannot give a completion date because she is not personally doing the reconciliation, and the consultant doing the reconciliation does not have to answer publicly because he is now being treated as a consultant rather than interim CFO, then the accountability structure is not just unclear. It is functionally broken.
The public is being told the work is too technical for the CFO to timeline, but too consultant-driven for the consultant to answer publicly. That leaves no clear person accountable for final delivery.
That is not acceptable for a state-required audit, especially after this much time and public money.
Someone has to own the outcome.
Seventh: the bond issue is real.
According to the article, Wilton’s bond advisor said the town’s credit position remains strong, but after June 30, Wilton will not be able to issue new bonds until the FY2025 audit is completed and a new rating is issued.
This affects more than paperwork. If Wilton cannot issue new bonds after June 30, capital projects that depend on borrowing may be delayed, reprioritized, or put into a holding pattern until the audit is finished and a new rating is issued.
In general, bonding is how towns finance major long-term capital needs, such as school facility projects, road or bridge work, town building improvements, public safety equipment, sewer or infrastructure projects, and other large expenses that are paid over time rather than absorbed in a single operating budget year.
That is why the timeline matters.
To me, the most important distinction is this:
I understand that this work may be complex. But after roughly nine months and potentially more than $300,000 in public cost, it is much harder to accept that residents still do not have a clear answer on what has been completed, what remains unfinished, who owns final delivery, and when the audit can actually proceed.
Residents deserve a plain-language status report that answers:
1. Which accounts remain unreconciled?
2. What specifically remains unfinished in the general fund?
3. Who is completing each remaining task?
4. Who is accountable for final delivery?
5. What has been paid to date?
6. What additional cost is expected?
7. What exactly has been delivered for the money already spent?
8. Why has the consultant not appeared publicly before the boards to explain the status?
9. What is the projected completion timeline?
10. What are the consequences if the work is not completed before December?
11. When will the BOF and public receive a complete written update?
The issue is not panic.
The issue is accountability.
Public reassurance is not a substitute for operational clarity.