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Small Business Administration OIG

SBA’s Restaurant Revitalization Fund Program Award Practices

This SBA OIG pandemic oversight report reviewed the U.S. Small Business Administration’s Restaurant Revitalization Fund application review and approval process. The objective of this review was to determine whether the controls SBA implemented to award RRF program funds in accordance with the Act and other applicable guidance were effective. SBA developed an implementation plan including a risk framework that was intended to reduce the risk of making improper payments and awarding Restaurant Revitalization Funds (RRF) to ineligible recipients. However, the plan did not include all program...
Department of Transportation OIG

FAA Did Not Fully Follow Its Processes When Awarding and Administering CARES Act-Funded Airport Development Grants and Contracts

What We Looked At The Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act provided the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) with $10 billion in funding, including about $525 million for airport development expenses. FAA distributed these funds through its Airport Improvement Program (AIP), which requires grant recipients to comply with various Federal procurement requirements, including Buy American Preferences. Previous Office of Inspector General (OIG) audits identified weaknesses in FAA’s processes for awarding and administering AIP grants and its oversight of CARES Act funds. Given...
Small Business Administration OIG

Ending Active Collections on Delinquent COVID-19 Economic Injury Disaster Loans

The Small Business Administration's (SBA) Office of Inspector General (OIG) is issuing this management advisory to bring attention to concerns regarding SBA’s decision to end active collections on delinquent COVID-19 Economic Injury Disaster Loans (EIDL) with an outstanding balance of $100,000 or less. First, SBA’s decision to cease collections risks violating the Debt Collection Improvement Act of 1996, which prohibits ending collections on fraudulent, false, or misrepresented claims, because SBA OIG and other oversight agencies are continuing to work on identifying COVID-19 EIDL fraud that...
Small Business Administration OIG

SBA’s Oversight of Restaurant Revitalization Fund Recipients

We reviewed the U.S. Small Business Administration’s (SBA) oversight of Restaurant Revitalization Fund (RRF) recipients. The American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 authorized SBA to administer the RRF and provided $28.6 billion to assist eligible small businesses adversely affected by the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. We determined program officials developed a plan for monitoring RRF award recipients use of funds and recovering unused or improperly awarded funds. However, program implementation was not executed in accordance with the plan. We made six recommendations for SBA to...
Department of Transportation OIG

DOT Has Effectively Managed the Aviation Manufacturing Jobs Protection Program and Should Capture Lessons Learned From Its Oversight Efforts

What We Looked At The American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) established the Aviation Manufacturing Jobs Protection (AMJP) program in March 2021. To support the program, the ARPA appropriated $3 billion in funding via the Department of Transportation (DOT) through September 2023 for eligible companies engaged in aviation manufacturing and services, maintenance, repair, and overhaul activities. Program funds would allow these companies to continue paying employee wages, salaries, and benefits or rehire employees who were furloughed as a result of the pandemic, and Congress expected DOT to award the...
Department of Transportation OIG

FTA Can Enhance Its Controls To Mitigate COVID-19 Relief Funding Risks

What We Looked At Since March 2020, Congress has provided $69.5 billion in supplemental funding to the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) to help transit systems in the United States mitigate the impacts of the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. As of August 1, 2022, FTA had obligated over $63 billion and expended over $46 billion. In addition to increased funding, the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES), Coronavirus Response and Relief Supplemental Appropriations (CRRSA), and American Rescue Plan (ARP) Acts permitted changes in how recipients use FTA funds...
Small Business Administration OIG

COVID-19 and Disaster Assistance Information Systems Security Controls

This report presents the results of our audit to determine whether the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) maintained effective management control activities and monitoring of the design and implementation of third-party operated SBA systems. SBA needed information technology systems from third-party service providers that could improve the system efficiency and productivity to process high transaction volumes, transmit data between other information systems, and safeguard the integrity and confidentiality of the personally identifiable information processed by the programs. We found the...
Small Business Administration OIG

COVID-19 Economic Injury Disaster Loan Applications Submitted from Foreign IP Addresses

We evaluated the U.S. Small Business Administration’s (SBA) controls to flag or prevent potentially fraudulent Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) Economic Injury Disaster Loan (EIDL) applications submitted from foreign Internet Protocol (IP) addresses. Although the agency implemented several layers of controls to prevent or reduce fraud from foreign countries, individuals at foreign IP addresses were able to access the COVID-19 EIDL application system. SBA received millions of attempts to submit COVID-19 EIDL applications from foreign IP addresses and stopped most of them; however, the agency...
Department of Transportation OIG

FAA Quickly Awarded CARES Act Funds but Can Enhance Its Oversight Approach To Promote Effective Stewardship

What We Looked At The Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act provided the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) with $10 billion to help airports deal with the public health emergency caused by Coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19). FAA awarded $9.1 billion in grants to airports nationwide, using its existing Airport Improvement Program (AIP) to distribute the funds. Our objective for this self-initiated audit was to assess whether FAA’s policies and procedures for awarding and overseeing CARES Act grants are sufficient to protect taxpayer interests. What We Found Leveraging the AIP...
Department of Housing and Urban Development OIG

Interim Audit Memorandum – The HUD Single Family Insurance Operations Division Should Take Additional Action To Inform Homeowners of Changes to Its FHA Refund Process Resulting From the COVID-19 Pandemic

We audited the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s (HUD) response to COVID-19 to determine if it appropriately, effectively, and efficiently tracked, monitored, and issued Federal Housing Administration (FHA) refunds owed to homeowners with terminated loans. During our field work, the Coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic began and as a result, we developed a second, more urgent audit objective to determine how COVID-19 has affected policies, procedures, and distribution of FHA refunds and whether HUD’s response was appropriate. We determined that COVID-19 generally did not...