State & Local Reports

EFPR Group, CPA's PLLC, has been engaged by the Office of the District of Columbia Auditor to assess whether the $495 million received by the District of Columbia from the Coronavirus Relief Fund which was established under the CARES Act were spent in compliance with Federal and District of Columbia laws and regulations. As part of the scope of this engagement, the receipt of the $495 million was observed and analyzed to verify that the District of Columbia received the maximum available from Federal legislation. 

The Broward Office of the Inspector General (“OIG”) concluded an investigation into an allegation that former City of Plantation Mayor Lynn Stoner (“the Mayor” or “Mayor Stoner”) provided false information to benefit a private developer. We substantiated the allegation, finding that the Mayor engaged in a pursuit to wrongfully help the now deceased president and founder (“the Developer’s President” or “the President”) of a group of related development companies (“the Developer”) as well as the Developer itself. As Mayor Stoner’s efforts included lying to help the Developer secure at least $95 million in loans and attempting to influence the City’s building official to violate his statutory duties under the Florida Building Code, her behavior amounted to criminal and ethical misconduct.

The Department of Internal Auditing (DIA) has conducted an audit of Employee Recruitment, Hiring, and Retention for the period January 1, 2022 to December 31, 2022. The main objective was to assess the effectiveness and efficiency of employee policy and procedures (especially those related to benefits and compensation) on recruitment, hiring, and retention of new and current employees. To accomplish these objectives DIA relied on authoritative guidance to determine best practices for which to assess employee policies and procedures. DIA made its assessments by conducting interviews with management and staff regarding processes, reviewing the employee policy and procedures (“HR Employee Handbook”), and obtaining various documentation from staff. In addition, where best practices were observed, DIA performed audit procedures to determine effectiveness and efficiency. Audit procedures disclosed internal control weaknesses related to pre-employment screening (“background checks”). DIA recommended that Human Resources implement a checklist to ensure that all pre-employment screening reports are completed and adequately reviewed for the proper employment decisions. DIA’s assessment of the employee recruitment, hiring, and retention was limited because of scope limitations. DIA was denied access to records by the Personnel Review Commission (PRC), and thus DIA was unable to assess certain recruitment and hiring processes of Classified employees. Also, due to recent challenges to DIA's jurisdictional authority to perform audits, DIA's assessment was limited to Executive agencies.

The Cuyahoga County Department of Internal Auditing (DIA) conducted an audit of Public Work’s processes and procedures relating to revenue and receivable for facilities administered by Public Works-Property Management and Public Works-Fiscal for the period of January 1, 2022 through December 31, 2022. The main objective was to assess the adequacy of monitoring activities regarding revenue generated from County owned facilities. This included processes to ensure ongoing compliance with leasing policies and procedures and the ongoing activities of property management including billings, collections, lease increases, etc. The work was limited to leases in which the County was the lessor. Additionally, DIA assessed County processes for compliance with Governmental Accounting Standards Board (GASB) regulation GASB-87. Audit procedures disclosed internal control weaknesses associated with lack of policies and procedures, lease term monitoring, account receivable reconciliations, lack of lease record retention, and lack of verification of rent paid.