Federal Reports

The Office of the Inspector General audited costs billed to the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) by Accenture Federal Services LLC (AFS) under Contract No. 14910. AFS provides enterprise architecture and information technology infrastructure services to TVA under the contract. The contract provided that work could be performed using time and material or fixed price payment terms as agreed by the parties in purchase orders (PO). Our audit objectives were to determine (1) if AFS billed TVA in accordance with the contract's terms and (2) the reasonableness of TVA's process for evaluating proposed fixed price tasks issued under the contract. Our audit scope included approximately $64.9 million in costs billed to TVA by AFS from the inception of the contract, March 25, 2020, through October 27, 2022.All costs billed to TVA by AFS during our audit scope were for fixed price projects. We determined the fixed price POs were billed in accordance with the milestone payment schedules that had been authorized in the POs. However, we determined TVA did not have a process in place to determine the reasonableness of the fixed prices it paid to AFS. Specifically, TVA Supply Chain did not:Compete the fixed price tasks among similar vendors although it had informed TVA senior management it intended to do so; orObtain detailed breakouts of AFS's fixed price proposals to determine the reasonableness of the prices. A contract technical steward in TVA's Technology and Innovation business unit informed us TVA relied on AFS's assertions that the fixed prices had been built up and calculated using the contract's pricing schedule. However, no validation of AFS's assertions were performed. (Summary Only)

Audit of Direct Loan Program Recipient –Mesa Airlines, Inc.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) did not accurately measure and publicly report its progress in disrupting and dismantling transnational criminal organizations (TCO) from fiscal years 2017 through 2022.

The Department of Homeland Security does not plan to apply the operating policies of Title 28 of the Code of Federal Regulations (C.F.R.) Part 23, Criminal Intelligence Systems Operating Policies, to the Homeland Advanced Recognition Technology System (HART) because it has determined, and we concur, that HART is not a criminal intelligence system, as defined by 28 C.F.R. Part 23. Instead, HART is an identity service provider and data repository that will match, store, and share personally identifiable information. Therefore, HART must operate in accordance with the Privacy Act of 1974 and the EGovernment Act of 2002.

The objectives of the audit were to determine whether the Washington Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction (Washington) had an adequate oversight process in place to ensure that (1) local educational agencies’ (LEA) American Rescue Plan (ARP) Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER) plans met applicable requirements and (2) LEAs use ARP ESSER funds in accordance with applicable requirements and their approved LEA ARP ESSER plans. We found that Washington did not have an adequate review and approval process to ensure that LEA ARP ESSER plans met all applicable requirements. As a result, the public did not have sufficient insight into how the LEAs planned to spend ARP ESSER funds. Washington was required to ensure that LEAs submitted ARP ESSER plans that were complete and timely; however, we found that Washington did not ensure LEAs’ compliance with all Federal requirements and guidance for creating transparent and understandable plans. During the audit, Washington was responsive to the issues we identified and initiated corrective action to ensure that Federal requirements and guidance were met.

The Veterans Health Care Act of 1992 mandates that manufacturers discount drugs they sell to VA, the Department of Defense (DOD), the Public Health Service, and the Coast Guard. The OIG conducts individual audits of manufacturers that have self-disclosed potential noncompliance. This review, however, was conducted to proactively determine the number of covered drugs that manufacturers did not make available as required and the possible reasons. The OIG found manufacturers did not make 22.8 percent of drugs covered by the law available at a discount. This resulted in an estimated $28.1 million in overcharges to VA and the DOD. The OIG recommended better communicating to manufacturers about exemptions and familiarizing them with the law.

Our audit objective was to assess NOAA’s progress in defining GeoXO’s mission and establishing programmatic baselines. We found the program should: I. Evaluate its plans for the Central satellite mission. II. Improve its approach to achieving performance gains.