ISA-2026-558

In late 2025, thousands of Rocky Mount utility customers unexpectedly received two utility bills within a single month, triggering public confusion, complaints, and concerns that the City of Rocky Mount (City) had improperly charged residents during a period of ongoing fiscal distress. The City claimed that it had issued the additional bills to correct ongoing delays between utility meter reading and billing dates.

In response to the public’s concerns, and at the request of the Mayor and City Council, the Office of the State Auditor completed a performance audit to determine:

• The cause of the utility billing delays,
• Whether the City’s actions to correct the delays caused customers to be improperly billed, and
• The extent to which the City took corrective action to remediate the cause and impact of the delays.

The audit found that:

• The cause of the utility billing delays was unauthorized and undetected modifications to the meter reading and billing schedules; and that
• The City’s December 2025 actions to correct the billing delays did not cause customers to be billed improperly (double billed).

Additionally, the audit followed up on allegations related to the City’s utilities billing practices for those charged with governance of the city.

It found that City Council members, Charles “Verb” Roberson and T.J. Walker, taking advantage of temporary measures to ease the impact of the bill schedule correction, accumulated $30,231.28 in unpaid utility bills while continuing to receive utility services.

Details about each item are provided collectively in the Findings and Recommendations and Matter for Further Consideration sections of the report. The City agreed with the findings and recommendations, and its formal response is included in the report.

The audit disclosed an additional finding considered reportable under generally accepted government auditing standards. However, this finding is considered confidential information and cannot be released to the public in accordance with North Carolina General Statutes §132-6.1(c) and generally accepted government auditing standards.