Reports
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Pandemic Response Accountability Committee
Risk Advisory – Potential Identity or Other Fraud in SBA Pandemic Relief Programs
The Pandemic Response Accountability Committee (PRAC) is issuing this Risk Advisory to notify Small Business Administration (SBA) management of potential identity or other fraud in its COVID-19 Economic Injury Disaster Loan (EIDL) program, EIDL Advance program, and Paycheck Protection Program. The PRAC identified possible identity or other fraud in one or more of these SBA programs involving 945 minors (under 18 years old) and 231 elderly individuals (80 years and older) who are also listed as household members in the Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Low Rent and/or Housing Choice...
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...
Pandemic Response Accountability Committee
Key Insights: Identity Fraud Reduction and Redress in Pandemic Response Programs
This Insights Report highlights identity fraud related challenges in federal programs during the COVID-19 pandemic. By evaluating previous oversight work in this space from members of the PRAC’s Identity Fraud Reduction and Redress Working Group, this report presents best practices to reduce identity fraud before it occurs and to assist victims of identity fraud if it does occur. These best practices may be helpful for federal agencies to utilize moving forward. This report also identifies that across the federal government there is a larger focus on reducing identity fraud up front, while...
Pandemic Response Accountability Committee
BEST PRACTICES AND LESSONS LEARNED FROM THE ADMINISTRATION OF PANDEMIC RELATED UNEMPLOYMENT BENEFITS PROGRAMS
The Pandemic Response Accountability Committee (PRAC) is charged with conducting oversight of pandemic-related spending to prevent and detect fraud, waste, abuse, and mismanagement. In May 2021, we engaged MITRE, a not-for-profit federally funded research and development center, to conduct an independent study of lessons learned from the administration of pandemic-related emergency funding for unemployment insurance (UI) benefit programs in a sample of states. The objective of this study was to increase understanding of how states implemented pandemic UI benefit programs and how their...
Pandemic Response Accountability Committee
Key Insights: State Pandemic Unemployment Insurance Programs
This insights report provides a contextual understanding of the cross-cutting challenges states faced within their unemployment insurance (UI) programs and highlights the substantial work that has been done by State Auditors to ensure their states’ UI programs are functioning effectively. This report examines four common insights across 16 State Auditor Offices: (1) UI workloads surged for states; (2) the claims surge exploited internal control weaknesses; (3) uncommon and varying fraud schemes began to occur as the amount of federal funding expanded; and (4) state workforce agencies...
Peace Corps OIG
Final Report on the Peace Corps' Compliance with CARES Act Supplemental Funding Requirements
This audit assessed the Peace Corps' internal controls over the budget, obligation, and disbursement of CARES Act funds, including compliance with the law and other implementing guidance. We concluded that the Peace Corps complied with necessary provisions of the law and other relevant policies and did not issue any recommendations with this report.
Department of Transportation OIG
FTA Does Not Effectively Assess Security Controls or Remediate Cybersecurity Weaknesses To Ensure the Proper Safeguards Are in Place To Protect Its Financial Management Systems
What We Looked At The Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act of 2020 set up appropriations to support executive agency operations during the COVID-19 pandemic. The Federal Transit Administration (FTA) has received nearly $70 billion in CARES Act and other COVID-19 relief appropriations. FTA uses several financial management systems to approve, process, and disperse this funding for the transit industry’s COVID-19 response and recovery. Given the size of this investment, we initiated this audit. Our audit objective was to assess the effectiveness of FTA’s financial...
Pandemic Response Accountability Committee
Increasing Transparency into COVID-19 Spending
The objective of this review was to identify specific gaps in transparency in award data for federal assistance spending in response to COVID-19. We looked at 51,000 awards worth $347 billion that supported the pandemic response (as of June 15, 2021). The report includes three findings, including we found more than 15,400 awards worth $33 billion with meaningless descriptions that make it difficult to know how COVID-19 relief money was used. The report includes five recommendations to help improve the transparency into COVID-19 relief spending.