Federal Reports

We found that Recovery Act expenditures by the Maryland State Department of Education, Maryland Department of Public Safety and Correction, and two LEAs, Baltimore City Public Schools and Prince George’s County Public Schools, were generally allowable, reasonable, and accounted for in accordance with the recipients’ plans, approved applications, and applicable laws and regulations. However, we identified more than $736,400 in unallowable, unsupported, and inadequately supported expenditures at the two LEAs. For example, we found that Prince George’s County spent more than $108,800 for unapproved travel, and Baltimore City could not adequately support personnel expenditures totaling more than $249,700. In addition, although we found that the Recovery Act data reported by the State were generally accurate, complete, and in compliance with Recovery Act reporting requirements, the jobs data reported by the Maryland Department of Public Safety and Correction and the two LEAs were not accurate or complete. We made several recommendations, including that the Department require the Maryland State Department of Education to revise its monitoring instruments to ensure adequate oversight of LEA compliance with requirements for Federal grant funds’ use and accounting, return to the Department funds that were used for unallowable purposes, and provide documentation to support unsupported and inadequately supported expenditures or return the amount of those expenditures to the Department.

Section 11(d)(9) of the Inspector General Act of 1978, as amended, requires the Council of the Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency to submit to Congress and the President an annual report on the activities of the Integrity Committee. For more informatoin about the Integrity Committee, please visit the link below.

This report details the results of our evaluation ofthe Bureau of Land Management's (BLM), National Park Service's (NPS), and Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement's (OSM) emergency preparedness at their high hazard dams. High hazard dams under the purview of BLM, NPS, and OSM either have no requirement for emergency action plans (EAP) or have EAPs that have been inadequately exercised or reviewed or that have not been formalized. In addition, we found an absence of a uniform approach to monitoring high hazard dams not owned by BLM or NPS but located on BLM and NPS lands. We include 11 recommendations in our report that, if implemented, will help to improve emergency action planning at the three bureaus.