Federal Reports

Why We Did This Report

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Office of Inspector General initiated an evaluation of the risks to federal facility Superfund site remedies from sea-level rise or increased storm surge.

Summary of Findings

The OIG determined that 49 of the 157 federal facility Superfund sites on the National Priorities List are potentially at risk from sea-level rise or increased storm surge. Sea-level rise and increased storm surge at federal facility Superfund sites are of concern to the EPA because of the federal government’s role in overseeing cleanup at these sites and also because many of these sites are located near population centers and important ecological areas. Federal facility Superfund sites may be at risk if the cleanup remedies that have been implemented at those sites to keep people and the environment safe are susceptible to sea-level rise or increased storm surge.

The audit objectives were to determine whether program funds were managed in accordance with the ARC and Federal grant requirements.

The audit objective was to determine if the Web-Based Licensing (WBL) System effectively manages the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s (NRC) materials licensing and inspection information and provides for the security, availability, and integrity of the system data. 

The OIG found that the WBL System’s inactivity controls interrupt users’ work processes; WBL users are unable to edit role-based licensing information in the Export/Import and Decommissioning, Uranium Recovery and Waste Programs modules; the WBL User Guide lacks quality information for using certain WBL modules; WBL users are generally unfamiliar with the change control process; several WBL enhancements do not work as intended; the licensing and inspection modules do not contain quality data; and, WBL System data is not readily available for the agency to use in other applications.

The report contains 15 recommendations to increase the WBL System’s functionality, effectiveness, and users’ efficiency. 

Our objective was to assess the extent to which the company has effective processes and controls during the pre-award phase to ensure contracts it awards are in its best interest.

We found that certain pre-award contracting activities generally worked well, but we identified two areas where weaknesses place the company at greater risk of paying more than it should for goods and services. First, the company could better ensure its employees adhere to its requirements for contracts requiring cost estimates and technical evaluation committees. Second, consistent with considerations from our prior work, the company has opportunities to better identify and mitigate fraud risks that can occur during the pre-award phase of its procurement process. This includes collecting and analyzing data to detect contract and procurement fraud and identify suspicious patterns across solicitations

We recommended that the company’s Procurement department (1) develop and implement a process to assess ongoing solicitations to determine their compliance with company requirements, (2) develop additional guidance for contracting officers regarding cost estimate details, (3) collect and analyze pre-award data to identify fraud indicators, and (4) develop and implement additional recurring fraud training for employees involved in the pre-award phase.