Federal Reports

FEMA awarded $110 million in humanitarian relief funds provided by ARPA to the EFSP National Board to provide services to families and individuals encountered by DHS in communities most impacted by the humanitarian crisis at the Southwest border. As of September 8, 2021, the National Board awarded $80.6 million of the funds to 25 local recipient organizations (LRO) in California, New Mexico, Arizona, and Texas. We reviewed $12.9 million from 18 LROs and found they did not always use the funds consistent with the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 Humanitarian Relief Funding and Application Guidance (funding and application guidance).

Our objective was to assess whether the Postal Service’smanagement of trailer utilization is effective. To accomplish ourobjective, we analyzed trailer utilization data, HCR schedules,and load scan performance for FY 2022. Further, we conductedobservations at facilities with average trailer utilization above65 percent, between 40 and 65 percent, and below 40 percentduring FY 2022.

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At the request of the Tennessee Valley Authority's (TVA) Supply Chain, we examined the cost proposal submitted by a company for performance of nonnuclear modification and supplemental maintenance services. Our examination objective was to determine if the company's cost proposal was fairly stated for a planned 5-year, $579 million contract.In our opinion, the company's cost proposal was overstated. Specifically, we found the proposed markup rate for recovery of the company's workers' compensation and general liability costs exceeded the markup rate and application base provided for in TVA's request for proposal (RFP). We estimated TVA could avoid about $4.39 million over the planned $579 million contract by negotiating revised workers' compensation and general liability insurance markup rates and application base to comply with the RFP requirements.(Summary Only)

The EPA Office of Inspector General has observed that grantees and subrecipients may not be fully aware of key fraud prevention and enforcement measures.

We audited the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s (HUD) Office of the Chief Procurement Officer’s use of its quality assurance surveillance plan (QASP) for its Atlanta Homeownership Center field service management (FSM) housing contracts. We initiated the audit to support HUD’s priority on increasing efficiency in procurement. An assessment of HUD’s use of its QASP, as part of its 3.10 FSM 5-year contract solicitation, could help HUD improve its overall effectiveness in contract administration. Our audit objective was to determine whether HUD effectively administered QASPs for its FSM contracts to assist in achieving HUD’s mission.HUD’s Atlanta Homeownership Center did not effectively develop and implement a QASP for the six FSM contracts reviewed. It did not (1) include all contract performance tasks requiring surveillance in its monitoring plans, (2) sufficiently review and accurately rate contractor performance, or (3) consistently document contractor performance in the Contractor Performance Assessment Reporting System (CPARS). These conditions occurred because HUD lacked controls to ensure that the QASP was used for contractor performance monitoring. Instead, HUD implemented a field service manager contract monitoring plan to measure contractor performance in a freestanding database, which did not include all performance standard tasks required for monitoring and did not align with the contracts’ acceptable quality levels of performance measurement. As a result, HUD lacked the structure necessary to ensure that contractors were held accountable for their performance in accordance with contractual requirements.We recommend that HUD’s Chief Procurement Officer (1) direct the contracting officers to update the QASP to include all minimum performance requirements and oversee the implementation of the QASP with HUD’s FSM contracts, (2) require the contracting officers to timely complete CPARS reports and submissions to the governmentwide system for use by all Federal agencies, (3) require all staff involved in FSM contracts’ oversight to maintain required documentation to support the contracts, and (4) require the contracting officers to designate contracting officer representatives in a timely manner. We also recommend that the Acting Deputy Assistant Secretary for Single Family Housing ensure that contracting officer representatives (1) are involved with the development, implementation, and documentation of the FSM QASP to monitor contractor performance; (2) ensure that ratings are aligned with the contract; and (3) complete CPARS in a timely manner.