Department of the Interior

The OIG investigated allegations that a Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) manager had used his position for the private gain of a friend, overruled decisions made by an employee’s supervisor regarding the employee’s leave and telework requests, and improperly influenced the award of a contract because...

The OIG investigated allegations that an Interior Business Center (IBC) official reprised against a subordinate employee by suspending the employee’s security clearance after the employee filed an Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) complaint against the official.We determined that the employee made...

The OIG investigated allegations that senior management within the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) Gulf of Mexico Region reprised against an employee for disclosures she made to BOEM officials. The employee also filed similar complaints under Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) provisions...

The OIG investigated an allegation that a National Park Service (NPS) contractor in the U.S. Virgin Islands attempted to provide a cash bribe to an NPS employee. We also investigated allegations that a park supervisor influenced Government personnel to hire a family member as a contractor, that...

The OIG investigated an allegation that Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) Administratively Determined (AD) firefighters intentionally set wildland fires for profit on the Cherokee Reservation in Cherokee, NC.We found that firefighters Raymond Swayney, Grady Davis, Zachary Winchester, and three others...

We investigated whether the boundaries of Utah’s Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument (GSENM) were modified, at least in part, for the personal financial benefit of former Utah State Representative Michael Noel, who owned property along the GSENM border and who is currently the executive...

We completed an inspection of the Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM’s) small miner (those with 10 or fewer claims) mining claims. We focused on whether the BLM monitors these claims to ensure that they are legitimate, that maintenance fees are paid, and, if these fees are waived, that the required...

The OIG investigated allegations that Prime 8, LLC, a company that conducted oil and gas operations and inspections in the Gulf of Mexico, violated departmental regulations and created records to support fictitious inspections of offshore platforms regulated by the Bureau of Safety and Environmental...

The Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) requested that we audit costs claimed on the Crow Tribe’s Methamphetamine Initiative Program, under Agreement No. A12AV01171. We could not perform the audit because the Tribe did not provide the necessary documentation for its claim, such as contractor invoices...

We audited the costs claimed by the Washington State Department of Fish and Wildlife under grants awarded by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) through the Wildlife and Sport Fish Restoration Program. The audit included claims totaling approximately $66.9 million on 47 grants that were open...