Reports

The COVID-19 pandemic caused a surge in demand for ventilators and provoked concerns about potential supply shortages across VA medical facilities. During the course of a previous broader review, the VA Office of Inspector General (OIG) uncovered a potential issue with the number of ventilators procured and stored at the Audie L. Murphy Memorial Veterans’ Hospital in San Antonio, Texas, and sought to determine whether they had been properly requested, acquired, received, and accounted for. The OIG found the facility acquired more ventilators from March 1, 2020, through November 30, 2021, than...

In FY 2021-22, state agencies administered $20.2 billion in federal financial assistance, including $5.9 billion that was expended related to the public health emergency and that was separately identified in the State’s Schedule of Expenditures of Federal Awards. Our audit focused on 22 federal programs that accounted for 58.9 percent of the federal financial assistance administered. We provided an unmodified opinion on federal compliance for 21 of the programs we reviewed. However, we again qualified our opinion on compliance for certain requirements related to the Emergency Rental Assistance...

The PRAC’s Pandemic Analytics Center of Excellence (PACE) data scientists identified $5.4 Billion in potential identity fraud associated with over 69,000 questionable Social Security Numbers (SSNs) used on applications across disbursed loans in the Small Business Administration’s COVID-19 Economic Injury Disaster Loan Program and Paycheck Protection Program. Through collaborative verification methods with the Social Security Administration, we identified that these SSNs were used in connection with over 99,000 applications and warrant further scrutiny. The results of this Fraud Alert...

This report is a summary of the Pandemic Response Accountability Committee’s accomplishments between April 1, 2022, and September 30, 2022.

We provided unmodified audit opinions on University of Wisconsin (UW) System’s FY 2021-22 financial statements, including its aggregate discretely presented component units. We also completed a limited-scope review of how UW institutions administered supplemental federal funds from three sources. We found that UW institutions used $239,200 from the Higher Education Emergency Relief Fund for costs that were unallowable by criteria that the federal government established. In addition, we recommend UW System Administration improve its oversight of a new computer application.

We provided unmodified audit opinions on the State of Wisconsin’s FY 2021-22 financial statements. These financial statements are included in the State’s Annual Comprehensive Financial Report. We reported seven significant deficiencies in internal control over financial reporting, and we made 24 recommendations to state agencies. We also reviewed certain aspects of the federal funding the State received for the public health emergency, and we included in our report certain other matters of interest related to the State’s activities in FY 2021-22.

As requested by the Joint Legislative Audit Committee, we have completed a limited-scope review of how the Department of Administration (DOA) used supplemental federal funds provided in response to the public health emergency. DOA paid $2.2 billion to other state agencies and spent $1.5 billion on its own programs. As of June 30, 2022, $1.8 billion in discretionary funds were remaining. In December 2022, DOA indicated it had plans for using most of these funds.

Recognizing how critical telehealth has been to the federal COVID-19 response, the PRAC Health Care Subgroup—which includes six Federal Offices of Inspectors General—worked together to provide insights on the use of telehealth and its associated program integrity risks.

The Pandemic Response Accountability Committee’s (PRAC) Health Care Subgroup developed this report to share insights about the expansion—and the emerging risks—of telehealth in selected programs across six federal agencies during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic. The selected programs, which provided telehealth services to about 37 million people in 2020 (up from just three million in 2019), included the Veterans Health Administration, Medicare, TRICARE, Federal Employees Health Benefits Program, Office of Workers’ Compensation Programs, and Department of Justice prisoner healthcare...

The OIG reviewed the Veterans Health Administration’s (VHA) progress in monitoring their follow-up of canceled appointments during the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2020, the OIG reported that VHA had not followed up on about 32 percent of canceled appointments. VHA then implemented the Cancelled Appointments and Consult Management Initiative and created a cancellation report to track follow-up conducted for appointments originally scheduled to occur after July 21, 2020. The report allowed tracking by types of care, by month, and cumulatively, but VHA did not use all the reporting features. VHA...