Editor’s note: This story was updated at 12:30 p.m. Thursday to include information from the city’s new auditor.
By GARRET JAROS/Lincoln Chronicle
WALDPORT – The city of Waldport has not submitted a state required annual audit since 2020, leaving a vocal few in the community as well as recently-elected mayor Heide Lambert to question why – and not finding the answer satisfactory.
The auditing arm of Oregon’s Secretary of State’s office is also disputing the city’s answer.
City manager Dann Cutter, who is responsible for contracting an auditing firm to complete the audits, has answered the question publicly on several occasions, kept the council apprised over the years and even posted about it on the city’s Facebook page.
But five days after Cutter was quoted in a June 13 Lincoln Chronicle article to again explain the reasons for the delays, the audit manager for the Oregon Secretary of State’s office emailed a letter to Waldport’s mayor and city council. A copy was also sent to the Chronicle.
“City officials have been quoted in social media and news publications stating the Secretary of State’s Office gave permission for the city to file late and that we have urged the city to keep their auditor even though they were falling behind,” Amy John wrote in the letter.
“As a general rule, we avoid providing guidance to municipalities on how they should or should not conduct their affairs, including when to engage or disengage with audit firms,” John continued. “We’re happy to work with municipalities to provide information and options, but decisions of that nature are up to municipality management …”
The letter went on to conclude that the city is responsible for compliance and is accountable for transparent and timely financial reporting which includes “effectively managing contractual agreements.” It can be a challenge to find an available licensed municipal auditor, the letter also said, but that does not preclude the city from complying with state and municipal audit law.
The Chronicle reached out to the Secretary of State’s Office to clarify whether “as a general rule” they avoid guidance or whether in the case of Waldport had in fact not given the guidance Cutter said they did.
“We didn’t,” Tess Seger, deputy chief of staff for communication with the audits division said July 1. “And I think, as Amy clarified in the letter, we did tell them that they need to follow the laws. We told them what the laws were. But we didn’t tell them how to make that happen.”
When asked again to be sure there was no doubt, Seger said the city was not told to stick with an auditor or that filing late audits was okay.
Cutter’s unwavering answer
The long and the short of Cutter’s answer to the question of why the audits have not been completed and the advice he said he received from the Secretary of State’s Office has not changed.
“I found it very frustrating to have my integrity questioned in such a way like that out of the blue when I feel I have worked in good faith to do everything they suggested,” Cutter said about the letter from John.
He replied to her letter the same day it was received.
The letter states the times he and John talked on the phone and what they talked about, Cutter said.
“And that we absolutely followed their informal advice,” Cutter said. “They were very careful not to put anything in writing. I would send her an email and she (John) would call me. But I absolutely responded to them and basically said, ‘No, that’s not true. Here’s the documentation and here are the timelines.”
Cutter emailed a copy of his response to the Chronicle and provided a printed copy.
The city hired Emerald CPA Group of Eugene to complete its 2021 audit but managing partner Mark Housen failed to finish the audit on time so Cutter consulted with John, he said in his response to her letter.
“You very specifically gave me the advice to ‘Stay the course’ with Mr. Housen noting that many other cities were in a similar situation,” Cutter wrote.
In June 2022, Cutter’s letter continued, he and John spoke after Housen promised the audit within weeks and failed to deliver.
“Again, your advice as I reported to council was to give him the benefit of the doubt and continue pursuing this, as municipal auditors were hard to find.”
By July 2023 and still no completed audit, Cutter wrote in his letter to John that he had then emailed her July 5 to say he felt the city needed to take legal action against Housen’s firm.
“You called me and we spoke of the concerns you were aware of regarding (Housen’s) firm … “that you had spoken with him and that he was almost finished,” Cutter wrote. “You at the time also advised us to file ‘Reports in lieu,’ and let him complete this audit instead of starting fresh.”
Finally, in November 2023, Cutter’s letter continued, when the audit was finished “We spoke where I detailed his attempt to extort the city for more funding” and that the city was seeking a new auditor, “to which you agreed was a wise course of action …”
The city hired Umpqua Valley Financial in early 2024 to catch up on the intervening missing audits. On Thursday, Cutter said he spoke with the auditor at Umpqua and was told they need a couple of new pieces of information and that they expect to be finished with the 2022 audit in August and the 2023 and 2024 audits by late fall.
Council response
The Chronicle reached out to Lambert, councilor Susan Woodruff, and council president Greg Dunn on Tuesday. All confirmed they had received the letter from the Secretary of State’s Office as well as Cutter’s response.
Woodruff said she was satisfied with Cutter’s response because the council had been talking about it throughout the process.
“And when she sent the letter that she did, to me it just smacked of she was covering her ass,” Woodruff said. “Because she kept telling him stuff but then when she had to back it up or not back it up, she didn’t want to back it up because it is not probably according to (purposeful cough) Hoyle as far as what they are supposed to do and what they are supposed to say.
“So, I really don’t have any concern about it,” she added. “And I think we are getting close to having it (audits) done.”
Dunn also felt Cutter’s letter settled the issue and called it pretty “cut and dried.”
“I am concerned a little bit about no emails and that it’s mainly over the phone,” Dunn said.
But Lambert said Cutter’s response did not settle the issue for her.
“I guess I want to wait and see what their response is going to be,” said Lambert, who has been clashing with Cutter since becoming mayor in January. “And I guess that’s because of my own experience with Dann Cutter because he has a way of making his own narratives. I would like to hear back from Amy (John) because I think she’s going to come back and say ‘No, we didn’t ever tell you that it was okay to not get your yearly audits done.’
“And I don’t think she’s going to be able to prove that, but he’s not going to be able to prove that she did and that’s kind of the world we’re in with Dann Cutter,” Lambert said. “There’s not a lot in writing. I want more in writing. He has a tendency to translate things to council and not give information directly from the source.”
State audit division response
After learning from Cutter of his same-day response email to John, the Chronicle again reached out to the audit division to ask about his response.
John is out of the office until July 23, Seger said via email, so she is unable to confirm whether she received Cutter’s response letter.
“However, we checked with her entire team, and no one is aware of a response from the city of Waldport,” she wrote. “They are more than welcome to forward their original email … In any case, our team stands by the content of our letter dated June 18.”
In response to the Chronicle’s email asking if it could be simply sorted by noting it was informal advice from John and not formal advice, Segar wrote – “Of course, there is always a possibility that there could have been a misunderstanding, but that is why we sent the letter to make sure our position was clear: we do not provide guidance to municipalities on how they conduct business. We just tell them what the law is and remind them to follow it.”
Cutter resent his email to John after speaking with the Chronicle on Tuesday and learning that the state had no knowledge of his response letter and that it was not mentioned by Seger in her initial response to the newspaper’s query.
- Garret Jaros covers the communities of Yachats, Waldport, south Lincoln County and natural resources issues for Lincoln Chronicle and can be reached at GJaros@YachatsNews.com
I’m not sure where the Mayor claims I have ever said they told us it was okay to not get the audits done. I absolutely have maintained, as have they, that they have always said it is a legal requirement to do them, as both the State and the City agree. I have also provided guidance to the council on a regular basis.
However, here is the full letter from the state, my response and the letter we sent our former Auditor as referenced herein.
Letter from state – https://mcclibraryfunctions.azurewebsites.us/api/munidocDownload/31201/8285e6a8b8da4/pdf
Email to Council highlighting key updates they have received –
https://mcclibraryfunctions.azurewebsites.us/api/munidocDownload/31201/82860e95f9f96/pdf
Letter in response –
https://mcclibraryfunctions.azurewebsites.us/api/munidocDownload/31201/8285e6ec54443/pdf
Letter ended engagement with previous auditor –
https://mcclibraryfunctions.azurewebsites.us/api/munidocDownload/31201/8285f87df4d60/pdf
Mayor Lambert’s passive aggressive accusatory statements aside – the city is working diligently to complete the audits with Umpqua Valley Financial.
The “mayor” is not here for our community or our members. She treats our city hall employees as if they are less than. All while she has a personal vendetta against our city manager.
We need a mayor. She’s not the one for Waldport. We deserve much better!
There is a thing called a public election.
There also is a thing called a recall, which can be used to remove a mayor. But that requires effort.
What you do after speaking with a government official, especially regarding an issue so important as your city not having filed its required annual audit for multiple years, you fire off an email stating “This is to confirm our phone conversation today, in which you told me . . .. Please let me know in writing if your understanding of our conversation differs.” It’s very basic and would have avoided the current dispute between the state and the city, and the exacerbation of disputes within the city, however I’m not aware that the city has provided any evidence that this was ever done. I encourage the city to provide such evidence if it exists.
Jon French, Waldport
Exactly. You always follow up in writing. Especially when you manage a city.
Exactly. It’s time to hold them accountable. They haven’t filed an audit for years.
It is interesting that the Secretary of State’s website acknowledges that reporting delinquencies have increased by 243% over the past 8 years, with 603 reports outstanding as of May 2025. Why are delinquencies, in general, increasing?
https://sos.oregon.gov/audits/Documents/delinquent-filers.pdf
I am not surprised to hear about the backlog of the audits. That has already been reported. But the investigation done by Jaros revealed some new information. City Councilor Susan Woodruff’s comments really bother me. They, along with Greg Dunn’s, suggest a real bias against the states audit manager but they have no documents to verify anything Waldport’s city manager has told them.
Mayor Heide Lambert, on the other hand, seems like the voice of reason. I agree that it is wise to wait and see since the city manager is known to talk a good talk often without facts. The Waldport City Council needs to get to the bottom of this. Maybe Oregon’s attorney general could help.
You are all to blame. For 5 years you have not had an audit. You all should get your pay docked. There is no excuse for this.
The city council is all-volunteer.
I’d say “you get what you pay for”, but the city manager of Waldport makes @ $160,000 annually, plus benefits. The good citizens of Waldport can’t catch a break.
The Secretary of State’s office has made it clear that Waldport was never given permission to delay audits and remains fully responsible for timely compliance. The City Manager’s repeated blame on the Mayor, audit firms, and informal “advice” contradicts the state’s position and lacks documentation.
Transparency and accountability are essential. The Mayor supports completing the audits, and it’s the City Manager’s duty to ensure they get done on time. I urge the council to focus on facts, take responsibility, and deliver the audits promptly to restore public trust.
After reading the letter from the Secretary of State’s office, it’s crystal clear that the responsibility for the city’s delinquent audits lies with city leadership — not the Mayor, not the state, and not the audit firms.
The state plainly states they did not give permission to file late audits, nor did they advise the city to stay with a firm that was falling behind. In fact, they emphasized that Municipal Audit Law still applies — even when finding an auditor is difficult. That’s not a gray area. That’s the law.
So to hear the City Manager deflecting blame onto the Mayor, who has done nothing but ask for transparency, is unacceptable. And to hear Councilor Woodruff say they was just “covering herself” by putting things in writing? That’s completely backwards. Putting things in writing — like the Secretary of State’s office did — is exactly what transparency looks like.
Meanwhile, Councilor Dunn admits there’s no email record and says it was all handled “mainly over the phone” — yet somehow thinks that settles things. How? That’s the opposite of documentation and accountability.
The public deserves better. We deserve timely audits. We deserve leaders who take responsibility — not point fingers. And we deserve council members who take the facts seriously instead of brushing them off.
I agree wholeheartedly. I don’t know any of them and don’t know their beef with one another but here’s a thought — if it is your job, do it. If you can’t do it, move aside and let someone else do it.
It is appalling to hear the comments from city councilor Susan Woodruff who said “So, I really don’t have any concern about it” because it is concerning and is very serious. The audits should be done and should have been done by now. The excuses and unprofessionalism coming from Dan Cutter, who keeps trying to point the fingers is wrong, it’s his responsibility to do the audit just as advised from the States office because it’s the law. It’s even appalling to hear some council members just tag along even though there duties are to be keeping the city manager in check. We the taxpayers citizens in Waldport deserve to have it done. We need to know what’s going on with our tax payer money.