Open Recommendations

District leaders and the Gary Area, La Crosse, and Milwaukee Vet Center Directors determine reasons for noncompliance with employees completing select trainings in the required time frame, ensure completion, and monitor compliance.

District leaders and the Evanston, Gary Area, and Milwaukee Vet Center Directors determine reasons for noncompliance with completion of an outreach plan with all required strategic
components, ensure completion, and monitor compliance.

District leaders and the La Crosse Vet Center Director determine reasons for noncompliance with monthly automated external defibrillator inspections, ensure completion, and monitor compliance.

District leaders determine reasons why the closing of the Milwaukee Vet Center resulted in multiple communication failures, and ensure all clients are notified of the new location, the Vet Center Call Center has accurate information, and websites include correct location and phone number information.

The Readjustment Counseling Service Chief Officer considers developing written guidance for vet center closure and temporary relocation processes including oversight responsibilities.

We recommend that FNS continue to carry out the plan described in its S&EMP in order to publish IP and UP estimates for FNS SFSP in the accompanying materials to future annual financial statements, which includes PaymentAccuracy.gov. In the meantime, we recommend that FNS evaluate if some payments should be considered unknown payments by devising a method to determine the amount of potential IPs and report these as UPs until the above-mentioned methodology has been finalized. If FNS is unable to devise a method to do this, we recommend that this is disclosed in PaymentAccuracy.gov.
For each year of non-compliance…

We recommend FNS continue its efforts to develop an improved estimate that considers meal counting errors in the publication of a complete improper payment rates for the FNS CACFP-FDCH program and update its S&EMP to consider payments that have not been determined as either proper or improper during their analysis, as unknown payments.
For each year of non-compliance:
FNS should provide information for SFSP describing the actions that the agency will take to come into compliance. This information should be published on PaymentAccuracy.gov and serve as the plan for what FNS will submit to the appropriate authorizing and appropriations committees…

We recommend USDA and FSA update its policies and procedures over the reporting of expiring programs to identify and report root causes of improper payments in order to formulate corrective actions that are focused on the core issues that are under the control of the agency.

FSA: We recommend that management take the following actions to ensure compliance with the Payment Integrity Information Act of 2019:
• Maintain a focus on continuous improvement in the development and implementation of new mitigation strategies (e.g., examination of existing controls in place and the implementation of more effective controls) to decrease IP and UP rates to a tolerable rate each year. If a program’s IP and UP rate does not improve or increases, take sufficient steps to identify root causes and implement appropriate corrective action that will reduce the rates year over year until the rate is below 10%…

FNS: We recommend that the agency work with OCFO in taking the following actions to ensure compliance with the Payment Integrity Information Act of 2019:
• Maintain a focus on continuous improvement in the development and implementation of new mitigation strategies (e.g., examination of existing controls in place and the implementation of more effective controls) to decrease IP and UP rates to a tolerable rate each year. If a program’s IP and UP rate does not improve or increases, take sufficient steps to identify root causes and implement appropriate corrective action that will reduce the rates year over year until…

FSA: We recommend that the agency work with OCFO in taking the following actions to ensure compliance with the Payment Integrity Information Act of 2019:
• Improve processes and efforts to evaluate the effectiveness of corrective actions to assist in the reduction of the improper payments estimate rate below the 10% threshold
• Develop and monitor agency-level corrective actions corresponding to the identified root causes of improper payments
• Conduct ongoing monitoring of the state-level corrective actions and ensure that these corrective actions are being implemented
• Continue working with states to identify state-specific corrective action plans and ensure that…

FNS: We recommend that the agency work with OCFO in taking the following actions to ensure compliance with the Payment Integrity Information Act of 2019:
• Improve processes and efforts to evaluate the effectiveness of corrective actions to assist in the reduction of the improper payments estimate rate below the 10% threshold
• Develop and monitor agency-level corrective actions corresponding to the identified root causes of improper payments
• Conduct ongoing monitoring of the state-level corrective actions and ensure that these corrective actions are being implemented
• Continue working with states to identify state-specific corrective action plans and ensure that…

Reconcile the differences between grantees’ internal accounting records and FFRs to determine the propriety of the component payments or require grantees to perform this reconciliation. Additionally, AmeriCorps should test and include the unmatched reporting errors as unknown payment errors in the projection of the improper payment estimate.

Determine whether awardees associated with FFRs submitted for Seniors awards were submitted by eligible organizations during the FFR data pull process. If it is determined that any AmeriCorps Seniors grantees were ineligible to receive the grant, AmeriCorps should include the entire FFR as an improper payment.

Implement additional quality control steps, proposed in response to NFR 2, to its improper payment data pulling and sampling process to ensure that all payments included are appropriate for the programs determined to be susceptible to improper payments. 

Publish improper payment and unknown payment estimates for NST in the accompanying materials provided with the FY 2025 annual financial statements in accordance with OMB guidance. 

Update its NST test plan to require the tester to verify that sampled education awards were only used to cover allowable COA expenses for members who earned the award (unless appropriately transferred).

Improve its quality control procedures to ensure AmeriCorps selects its NST sample and extrapolates its NST improper payment estimates consistent with its NST SEMP. Specifically, its quality control procedures should ensure AmeriCorps:
a. Excludes only records in the payment population that do not represent applicable disbursements, as justified in its SEMP.
b. Extrapolates its improper payment estimate only on the payments included within the sampling frame, unless otherwise justified and approved by OMB.
c. Documents the methodology used to extract the NST payment population used for sampling and the procedures used to verify the payment population is complete and accurate.

Determine the allowability of $70,796 in total unsupported questioned costs on page 14 of the audit report and recover any amount that is unallowable.

Verify that Institut Panos corrects the two material weaknesses in internal control detailed on page 24 of the audit report.

Verify that Institut Panos corrects the two instances of material noncompliance detailed on page 32 of the audit report.

We recommend that USAID/Senegal verify that Government of Senegal, Ministry of National Education corrects the one instance of material noncompliance detailed on pages 43 and 44 of the audit report.

The OIG recommends the Under Secretary for Health evaluates facility leaders for appropriate supervisory behavior and professional communication and takes actions as needed.

The OIG recommends the Under Secretary for Health determines whether the Veterans Integrated Service Network Director and other Veterans Integrated Service Network leaders were aware of, but did not address, facility leaders’ unprofessional behavior and communication, and takes actions as needed.

The OIG recommends the Under Secretary for Health ensures the Veterans Integrated Service Network and facility directors oversee the inventory management system, resolve medical supply deficiencies, and monitor actions for sustained improvement.