Roy Ray, a former Akron mayor, Ohio Senate finance chairman and vice president of finance for the University of Akron, is questioning whether the state auditor should have put Akron into its new “fiscal caution” category.After looking over Akron’s state audits and other financial documents, Ray wrote a letter to Mayor Don Plusquellic this week that said the city is in “sound financial condition.”“I believe the auditor mistakenly found the city in a condition of fiscal caution,” Ray wrote in the two-page letter. “If he has issues with the way the books are kept, that is something the state and city finance professionals can work out. To imply that the city has overspent its resources or has done anything wrong financially is misleading and a disservice to the city of Akron.”Ray’s remarks were somewhat surprising, given that he is a Republican, as is state Auditor Dave Yost. Plusquellic is a Democrat.His letter, which Akron sent to Yost and local media outlets, is the latest in an ongoing dispute over Akron’s finances that began in October, when Yost released Akron’s 2010 audit and made the city the first municipality in Ohio to be placed into fiscal caution. He faulted the city for having too many funds and funds with negative balances.“I’ve got a 50-page plan signed by the mayor himself,” Yost said Wednesday, referring to a proposal Akron submitted to his office on Monday, which was the city’s second attempt to address his concerns. “That seems like a whole lot of fixing for nothing.”Yost, who is still reviewing Akron’s latest proposal, questioned whether Ray can provide an objective assessment of Akron’s finances. He said the city handled its finances the same when Ray was finance director and mayor in the late ’70s and early ’80s, which means Ray would logically think these methods were satisfactory.“It was like this when Roy Ray was mayor,” he said. “Does that make him an objective source?”Yost also questioned whether Ray looked at his office’s work papers or the fiscal caution report. If not, Yost invited Ray to meet with his staff to review these additional documents and show Ray some of the statutes he voted for when he was in the state legislature that help guide the action’s of the auditor’s office.“At the end of the day, this is an objective decision,” Yost said. “This is not really a judgment call.”Ray, in a telephone interview from Florida on Wednesday, declined Yost’s invitation.“I’m not going to get into a big, drawn-out affair,” said Ray, who retired from UA four years ago. “He’s entitled to his opinion. I’m entitled to my opinion. Let’s leave it at that.”At Plusquellic’s request, Ray said he looked at Akron’s audits from the past two years and the management letters that the auditor’s office gives municipalities. He said he “found nothing out of the ordinary.” He also pointed out that the city’s designations by bond- rating agencies continue to be positive, which is considered a good indicator of a municipality’s financial status.Ray said that when he was mayor, Akron established separate funds for projects, which resulted in numerous funds, and sometimes had negative fund balances at the end of the year when the city was waiting for reimbursement from other government agencies. But, he said, the city always had money in the bank to cover any negative balances — and still does today.“When you are running the city or county or any kind of entity with taxpayer dollars, fiscal caution is the name of the game to start with,” Ray said. “You have to run the finances in a prudent fashion.”In Akron’s second attempt at a plan to address Yost’s concerns, the city noted that it has significantly decreased its number of funds and the ones with negative balances. Akron leaders have said the city has the money to cover the funds with negative balances elsewhere in its budget. The city ended 2011 with a general fund carry-over of about $5 million.City leaders were pleased with Ray’s letter and his assessment of Akron’s finances.“This is from someone who knows city finances, university finance and how it works at the state,” said Finance Director Diane Miller-Dawson. “He’s not a person with a narrow point of view.”Stephanie Warsmith can be reached at 330-996-3705 or swarsmith@thebeaconjournal.com.