Auditor of North Carolina

The State Auditor of North Carolina is a statewide elected office in the U.S. state of North Carolina. The state auditor is a constitutional officer responsible for overseeing and reviewing the financial accounts of all state government agencies. The auditor also conducts performance audits of state agencies, ensures state agencies' accounting conforms with Generally Accepted Accounting Principles, evaluates the integrity of computer-generated information, and investigates the misuse of state funds or property. The incumbent is Beth Wood, who became state auditor on January 10, 2009. Auditors have been employed by North Carolina's government since it was an English colony. The Office of Auditor of Public Accounts was created in 1862. Six years later it was replaced by the Office of State Auditor, filled by a candidate popularly elected every four years and not subject to term limits. The state auditor was responsible for several accounting and fiscal duties for much of the position's existence, though these were assigned elsewhere in the 20th century. The state auditor leads the Department of State Auditor and sits on the North Carolina Council of State. History of the office The Fundamental Constitutions of Carolina, adopted on March 1, 1669, for the Province of Carolina, provided for twelve auditors to maintain various accounts, but there is no evidence that the offices were ever brought into use. Over the following decades, boards of auditors were appointed by the North Carolina General Assembly and the King of England's comptrollers to attend to matters in various localities as stipulated by the English crown. In 1782 the General Assembly appointed Richard Caswell as the Comptroller of the State of North Carolina, responsible for the maintenance of public accounts. The assembly also established ten boards of auditors for different areas of the state. In 1862 the General Assembly altered the previous system by establishing the Office of Auditor of Public Accounts, who was to be elected every two years by the legislature. The post was abolished in 1865. The North Carolina Constitution of 1868 created the Office of State Auditor, superseding the auditor of public accounts and abolishing the post of comptroller.