Federal Reports

The U.S. Postal Service needs effective and productive operations to fulfill its mission of providing prompt, reliable, and affordable mail service to the American public. It has a vast transportation network that moves mail and equipment among about 330 processing facilities and 31,100 post offices, stations, and branches. The Postal Service is transforming its processing and logistics networks to become more scalable, reliable, visible, efficient, automated, and digitally integrated. This includes modernizing operating plans and aligning the workforce; leveraging emerging technologies to provide world-class visibility and tracking of mail and packages in near real time; and optimizing the surface and air transportation network. The U.S. Postal Service Office of Inspector General (OIG) reviews the efficiency of mail processing operations at facilities across the country and provides management with timely feedback to further the Postal Service’s mission.This report presents the results of our self-initiated audit of the efficiency of operations at the Denver Processing and Distribution Center (P&DC) in Denver, CO. We judgmentally selected the Denver, CO, P&DC based on a review of first and last mile failures; workhours; scanning compliance; and late, canceled, and extra trips. The Denver P&DC is in the Western Division and processes letters, flats, and parcels. The Denver P&DC services multiple 3-digit ZIP Codes in urban and rural communities.

We found that the EPA's Brownfields Projects Program, a subset of the overall Brownfields Program, met the Executive Office of the President's Justice40 Initiative reporting requirements for fiscal year 2022 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act-funded projects. The program is also projected to meet the EPA's internal goal of ensuring that at least 40 percent of program benefits go to disadvantaged communities. However, the Agency overestimated the percentage of benefits going to disadvantaged communities for fiscal year 2022.

We audited the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), Office of Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity’s (FHEO) challenges in completing housing discrimination investigations within 100 days.  We initiated the audit due to the number of investigations reported in FHEO’s annual reports to Congress that exceeded 100 days.  Our objective was to survey and assess the challenges FHEO faces in completing investigations within 100 days for Title VIII complaints in accordance with the Fair Housing Act. Based on our survey, FHEO faces several challenges in completing investigations within 100 days for Title VIII complaints, including (1) limited staffing and training, (2) staff workload, (3) complexity of the case work, (4) uncooperative or unresponsive parties, and (5) inconsistent review processes with the Office of General Counsel (OGC).  Aware of these challenges, FHEO took steps to address its limited staffing and increase the availability of training.  However, FHEO does not have control over the complexity of the cases it receives and whether the parties to each case are cooperative or responsive.  Because of these challenges, 81 percent (122 of 150) of the respondents to our survey stated that completing investigations within 100 days was not attainable.  Due to these challenges, FHEO did not complete 70.2 percent of its investigations within 100 days from 2020 to 2022.  Despite being unable to control all the factors that lead to a timely investigation, FHEO has opportunities to review its investigative processes across regions to make processes more efficient and increase the number of timely outcomes.We recommend that HUD’s Deputy Assistant Secretary for Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity (1)  update protocols to promote consistent expectations for timely supervisory, legal, and headquarters reviews of complex cases; (2) review and update the memorandums of understanding with OGC for each region to identify and remove inefficiencies that can lead to longer FHEO investigation times and OGC review times and identify best practices that can be implemented across all regions; and (3) review and update investigative processes followed by each regional office to identify best practices that can be implemented across all regions and identify and remove inefficiencies that can lead to longer investigation times.