Federal Reports

We evaluated the National Park Service’s (NPS’) general agreements (GAs) to determine if the NPS oversees its GAs to ensure compliance with policies and governing laws.We found that the NPS did not oversee its GAs to ensure compliance with policies and governing laws. The NPS did not maintain a central inventory for its GAs and was unaware of the number of active GAs. Therefore, we selected three parks to review in the Intermountain Region: Yellowstone, Grand Teton, and Rocky Mountain.We found the NPS was misusing GAs at all three parks we reviewed, which is likely a result of the informal review process associated with these instruments. During our evaluation, we determined that the NPS used the GAs to provide financial assistance or transfer goods or services to non-Federal entities, in apparent contravention of policies and laws. Further, we noted that personnel who were not authorized to commit NPS resources signed the GAs that inappropriately transferred something of value, which puts the NPS at risk of unauthorized commitments. The NPS has neither provided clear, consistent guidance, nor provided training on how to develop and use GAs at the national level.We make five recommendations to help the NPS improve oversight of its GAs. Based on the NPS’ response to our draft report, we consider one recommendation unresolved, one recommendation resolved and implemented, and three recommendations resolved but not implemented. We will refer the recommendations to the Assistant Secretary for Policy, Management and Budget for resolution and to track implementation.

We reviewed 6 of the 11 recommendations from our 2018 evaluation report titled, The Bureau of Indian Education Is Not Ensuring That Background Checks at Indian Education Facilities Are Complete, to verify whether the Bureau of Indian Education implemented them.We confirmed that Recommendations 1 – 3 and 6 – 8 have been resolved and implemented.

We reviewed the 13 recommendations from our 2017 report titled Stronger Internal Controls Needed Over Indian Affairs Loan Guarantee Program to verify whether the Bureau of Indian Affairs’ Office of Indian Energy and Economic Development implemented them.We confirmed that the 13 recommendations have been resolved and implemented.

We reviewed Recommendations 1, 2, 5, and 6 from our 2016 report titled U.S. Department of the Interior’s Continuous Diagnostics and Mitigation Program Not Yet Capable of Providing Complete Information for Enterprise Risk Determinations to verify whether the OCIO implemented them.We consider Recommendations 1, 2, 5, and 6 resolved and implemented.

OIG reviewed USDA’s CoE initiative to determine if its functional areas were effective and sustainable and whether USDA complied with applicable laws and regulations.

Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs) in the Medicare Shared Savings Program (MSSP) may be eligible to receive shared savings payments from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) if the ACOs reduce health care costs and satisfy the MSSP quality performance standard for their assigned beneficiaries. As part of the standard, ACOs must report to CMS complete and accurate data on all quality measures. For performance year (PY) 2017, ACOs were required to report data on 31 quality measures through 3 methods of submission: a patient survey, claims and administrative data, and the designated CMS web portal. If ACOs do not report complete and accurate data, shared savings payments could be affected. Previous OIG audits of two selected ACOs assessed whether they reported complete and accurate data on selected quality measures. Our objective was to determine whether CMS’s monitoring activities were effective for ensuring that ACOs report complete and accurate data on quality measures.