[House Hearing, 114 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
EXAMINING MISMANAGEMENT IN OFFICE OF JUSTICE PROGRAMS GRANTMAKING
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HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON
GOVERNMENT OPERATIONS
OF THE
COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT
AND GOVERNMENT REFORM
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED FOURTEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
JULY 14, 2016
__________
Serial No. 114-141
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform
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COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND GOVERNMENT REFORM
JASON CHAFFETZ, Utah, Chairman
JOHN L. MICA, Florida ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland,
MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio Ranking Minority Member
JOHN J. DUNCAN, Jr., Tennessee CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York
JIM JORDAN, Ohio ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of
TIM WALBERG, Michigan Columbia
JUSTIN AMASH, Michigan WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri
PAUL A. GOSAR, Arizona STEPHEN F. LYNCH, Massachusetts
SCOTT DesJARLAIS, Tennessee JIM COOPER, Tennessee
TREY GOWDY, South Carolina GERALD E. CONNOLLY, Virginia
BLAKE FARENTHOLD, Texas MATT CARTWRIGHT, Pennsylvania
CYNTHIA M. LUMMIS, Wyoming TAMMY DUCKWORTH, Illinois
THOMAS MASSIE, Kentucky ROBIN L. KELLY, Illinois
MARK MEADOWS, North Carolina BRENDA L. LAWRENCE, Michigan
RON DeSANTIS, Florida TED LIEU, California
MICK MULVANEY, South Carolina BONNIE WATSON COLEMAN, New Jersey
KEN BUCK, Colorado STACEY E. PLASKETT, Virgin Islands
MARK WALKER, North Carolina MARK DeSAULNIER, California
ROD BLUM, Iowa BRENDAN F. BOYLE, Pennsylvania
JODY B. HICE, Georgia PETER WELCH, Vermont
STEVE RUSSELL, Oklahoma MICHELLE LUJAN GRISHAM, New Mexico
EARL L. ``BUDDY'' CARTER, Georgia
GLENN GROTHMAN, Wisconsin
WILL HURD, Texas
GARY J. PALMER, Alabama
Jennifer Hemingway, Staff Director
Sean Brebbia, Senior Counsel
Sharon Casey, Deputy Chief Clerk
David Rapallo, Minority Staff Director
------
Subcommittee on Government Operations
MARK MEADOWS, North Carolina, Chairman
JIM JORDAN, Ohio GERALD E. CONNOLLY, Virginia,
TIM WALBERG, Michigan, Vice Chair Ranking Minority Member
TREY GOWDY, South Carolina CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York
THOMAS MASSIE, Kentucky ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of
MICK MULVANEY, South Carolina Columbia
KEN BUCK, Colorado WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri
EARL L. ``BUDDY'' CARTER, Georgia STACEY E. PLASKETT, Virgin Islands
GLENN GROTHMAN, Wisconsin STEPHEN F. LYNCH, Massachusetts
C O N T E N T S
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Page
Hearing held on July 14, 2016.................................... 1
WITNESSES
The Hon. Michael E. Horowitz, Inspector General, U.S. Department
of Justice
Oral Statement............................................... 4
Written Statement............................................ 6
Ms. Beth McGarry, Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General for
Office of Justice Programs, U.S. Department of Justice
Oral Statement............................................... 13
Written Statement............................................ 15
Ms. Gretta Goodwin, Acting Director, Homeland Security and
Justice, U.S. Government Accountability Office
Oral Statement............................................... 20
Written Statement............................................ 22
Mr. Jeffrey Sedgwick, Ph.D., Executive Director, Justice Research
and Statistics Association
Oral Statement............................................... 44
Written Statement............................................ 47
EXAMINING MISMANAGEMENT IN OFFICE OF JUSTICE PROGRAMS GRANTMAKING
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Thursday, July 14, 2016
House of Representatives
Subcommittee on Government Operations
Committee on Oversight and Government Reform
Washington, D.C.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 2:14 p.m., in
Room 2247, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Mark Meadows
[chairman of the subcommittee] presiding.
Present: Representatives Meadows, Walberg, Carter, and
Plaskett.
Mr. Meadows. All right. The Subcommittee on Government
Operations will come to order. And without objection, the chair
is authorized to declare a recess at any time.
I want to thank you once again for the delay and for your
graciousness with that.
Obviously, the Office of Justice Programs, or OJP, as it is
commonly referred to, is the largest of three departments--of
the Department of Justice grantmaking entities. OJP gave out
more than $4 billion in fiscal year 2015, with about $1.2
billion issued for State, local, and tribal law enforcement,
plus another $251 million for the juvenile justice initiatives.
That is a lot of the programs and a whole lot of money.
There is no doubt that grants can provide an important resource
to State and local government entities, allowing them to do
important work in many areas, including crime prevention and
reduction of recidivism. The Office of Justice Programs has a
responsibility to effectively manage its grants program, and it
is our job in Congress to make sure that OJP is carrying out
its responsibility and spending the taxpayer dollars
responsibly and effectively.
Over the last decade, OJP has made improvements in its
grantmaking process, thanks in no small part to the oversight
provided by GAO and the Inspector General. We are here today to
discuss those improvements and also to discuss the status of
some of the open recommendations made by both GAO and the
Inspector General.
While OJP has made progress in its grant management, the
Inspector General's reports and audits show that there is still
room for improvement. For example, the IG published a report
last year that found that OJP's grant money was used to build
two correctional facilities that were at least 250 percent
larger than they needed at an excess cost of some $32 million.
This was a $70 million grant to the Navajo Division of Public
Safety to plan and construct a tribal justice facility, and
somewhere along the way the plans changed, and there was a
massive increase in the size and scope of that facility.
One of the facilities had an approved plan for a 42-bed
prison that ended up, they ended up building a facility that
had 132 beds. This, despite having an average jail occupancy
between 14 and 22 inmates a month. The other facility, with
averages of 7 to 11 inmates, ended up with 80 beds.
They built these buildings so big that they do not have
enough money to fully staff them. They sit there today largely
empty, a $70 million price tag for nearly empty prisons.
Look, my issue here is not about the grant itself. I can
tell you that in my district there have been the deployment of
some of these grants in effective ways. But it is blatantly
mismanaged taxpayer dollars, plain and simple, that we have to
address, and here is the question I would like to get to today.
Are we actually managing these grants at a sufficiently
detailed level to achieve results, prevent waste, fraud, and
abuse, or are we just checking the boxes? And so I am
interested to hear from all of our witnesses today on the many
issues presented by the DOJ's grant management and the progress
that has been made and the progress that still needs to be
made.
And so, with that, I would like to now recognize my good
friend, the gentlewoman from the Virgin Islands, Ms. Plaskett,
for her opening remarks.
Ms. Plaskett. Thank you so much, Mr. Chairman.
And good afternoon to all of you. Thank you for attending
this Subcommittee on Government Operations.
I want to thank you, Mr. Chairman, for holding today's
hearing to highlight very important office at the Department of
Justice, that being the Office of Justice Programs. Currently,
OJP oversees 7,000 active grants, some of which are mandated by
Congress, totaling more than $7.5 billion.
As a former prosecutor and also an official at the
Department of Justice where, working under the Deputy Attorney
General's office, I oversaw some of OJP's work, I know
firsthand what an important partner OJP is to our local and
State governments by providing resources for training,
coordination, and equipment to support law enforcement efforts.
OJP funds are used to support anti-gang initiatives,
bulletproof vest purchases, and programs to counter spousal or
child abuse and trafficking, human trafficking.
These grants make a difference in people's lives. Just 2
weeks ago, OJP reported that the Internet Crimes against
Children's Task Force, funded through OJP grant program,
arrested more than 1,300 suspected child predators. Last fall,
OJP announced the addition of five cities to the Violence
Reduction Network, a collaborative program between DOJ and
cities which have contributed to the arrest of criminals
suspected of violent crimes, such as sexual assault and
homicide.
As part of its own oversight, OJP assesses the risk of all
grant applicants and grantees to identify any high-risk
grantees that may require additional controls or corrective
actions. In fact, OJP actually exceeds the 10 percent statutory
goal for conducting extensive monitoring of grant dollars, and
less than 1 percent of grants are currently considered as high
risk.
To supplement its internal efforts, OJP relies on the
Office of the Inspector General. Independent audits of grantees
and review of OJP grant management, like those conducted by the
Inspector General and the Government Accountability Office,
which are here with us this afternoon, have aided the office in
making improvements to its management processes.
While the both the IG and GAO--that is a lot of acronyms
there--have singled out specific grant programs for concern in
recent years, OJP has acted in good faith to implement
corrective recommendations and close out those cases. As a
result of IG recommendations, OJP has taken significant steps
to change its policies and procedures, clarify or issue
guidance, put in place performance control, and remedy
unallowable costs.
For example, OJP has requested Treasury send a collection
notice to recruit unsupported expenditures from one grantee and
has offered individualized technical assistance to all grantees
under the DNA Backlog Reduction Program as it works to update
its program guidance.
In 2012, GAO found that DOJ needed to put into place better
controls to reduce the risk of duplication of grant awards,
including OJP grants. As a result, DOJ granting agencies now
coordinate with one another to ensure that grantees are not
unnecessarily receiving duplicative awards.
OJP's improvements to its grant management controls over
the past decade have been welcomed by grant applicants and
recipients. For example, OJP created the Office of Audit
Assessment and Management in fiscal year 2007 to conduct audits
of OJP processes and risk assessments of grant programs,
oversee program monitoring, and create policies to improve OJP
grant management.
Since then, applicants report experiencing better
communication of the grant peer review process, receiving a
more transparent and timely review of the strengths or
weaknesses of the grant proposal, and have frequent
communication about grant requirements and policy changes.
These changes make OJP--and OJP are lowering the risk to
taxpayers. But there is always room for improvement.
It is essential for OJP to continuously evaluate its
programs with the IG and with GAO for lessons learned and to
identify ways to improve its oversight and monitoring of grant
programs to ensure that funding is effectively and efficiently
used by grant recipients. I look forward to hearing from
today's witnesses about their observations and suggestions for
assisting OJP and this subcommittee in conducting robust
oversight of these grant dollars, which are vital to our State
and local partners.
Thank you.
Mr. Meadows. I thank the ranking member for her comments
and well thought out delivery.
And so, as I enter into this, I just want to thank all of
you for coming. I will hold the record open for 5 legislative
days for any Member who would like to submit a written
statement.
Mr. Meadows. We will now recognize our panel of witnesses.
Pleased to welcome the Honorable Michael Horowitz--welcome
back--Inspector General of the Department of Justice.
Ms. Beth McGarry, Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney
General of the Office of Justice Programs at the Department of
Justice. Welcome.
Ms. Gretta Goodwin, a Ph.D., Acting Director of Justice and
Law Enforcement Issues on the Homeland Security and Justice
team at the Government Accountability Office. Welcome.
And Mr. Jeffrey Sedgwick, Ph.D., Executive Director of the
Justice Research and Statistics Association.
Welcome to you all, and pursuant to committee rules, all
witnesses will be sworn in before they testify. So if you would
please rise and raise your right hand.
Do you solemnly swear or affirm that the testimony you are
about to give will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing
but the truth?
[Response.]
Mr. Meadows. Thank you.
Let the record reflect that all witnesses answered in the
affirmative.
And in order to allow time for discussion, please limit
your oral testimony to 5 minutes. However, your entire written
statement will be made part of the record.
And so, Mr. Horowitz, I recognize you for 5 minutes.
WITNESS STATEMENTS
STATEMENT OF HON. MICHAEL E. HOROWITZ
Mr. Horowitz. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member
Plaskett, members of the subcommittee. Thank you for inviting
me to testify today.
From fiscal year 2011 through fiscal year 2015, OJP awarded
over $10 billion in grants to thousands of recipients. During
that same time period, the OIG issued approximately 100 audits
of OJP grant awards, containing about 700 recommendations and
identifying approximately $100 million in dollar-related
findings.
In fiscal year 2015 and 2016, Congress additionally
authorized the department to issue over $5 billion in Crime
Victims Fund awards, with the vast majority likely to be OJP
grants. This significant increase in CVF grants requires OJP to
have sufficient controls and oversight in place to ensure that
those funds are used appropriately. We are currently conducting
a risk assessment of OJP's management of CVF grants in light of
this funding increase, and we're also auditing CVF grantees and
subgrantees' use of these funds.
Over the past several years, OJP and the department have
made positive strides in improving their grants management,
including implementing online grants management training,
enhancing its management of high-risk grantees, and
consolidating grant rules promulgated--that had been
promulgated separately by three DOJ grantmaking agencies into a
consolidated department grants financial guide.
While these advances are encouraging, protecting taxpayer
funds from mismanagement and misuse remains one of the most
significant challenges facing the department. The department
must undertake robust efforts to ensure that the billions it
gives out in grants are appropriately spent and that the public
receives the expected return on its investment.
Our past work has identified several instances where the
department grant monitoring was too limited and where site
visits were too few. In particular, we found breakdowns in
monitoring subgrantees to ensure that they are fulfilling all
grant conditions. It's also important for the department to
develop a results-oriented performance measures approach to
ensure the grant programs are meeting their intended goals and
producing a measurable outcome.
Such measures are critical for the department to
effectively assess which grant program should receive valuable
taxpayer funds. In addition to our audit work, the OIG conducts
grant-related investigations into possible fraud, embezzlement,
and conflicts of interest. In the past 5 fiscal years, those
investigations resulted in 13 criminal convictions and more
than $6 million in restitution and recoveries.
Our office participates in other efforts to improve grant
management and reduce fraud across the Federal Government. I
chair the Grant Fraud Working Group of the Financial Fraud
Enforcement Task Force, a diverse coalition of IG offices and
executive branch agencies. The working group looks to improve
our ability to investigate and prosecute grant fraud matters.
It played a key role in developing grant fraud training for
special agents, Government prosecutors, and auditors. The
working group also serves as an information-sharing platform
regarding best practices and our ongoing data analytics
efforts.
In concluding, I want to thank the committee for its
support, bipartisan support of the IG Empowerment Act. The bill
contains several important provisions that will assist
Inspectors General in conducting effective oversight, including
of grant awards.
For example, the bill ensures that IGs will have timely and
unimpeded access to agency and grant recipient records. It
allows OIGs to match data across agencies to help uncover
improper payments and wasteful spending, which will improve our
ability to detect grant fraud and uncover duplicative grant
awards, and it provides OIGs with the testimonial subpoena
authority, which will be a particularly helpful tool in
enabling IGs to gain critical evidence when conducting civil
and administrative grant fraud investigations.
I very much appreciate the House of Representatives passing
the legislation, and I hope that the Senate will take action
soon so that all Inspectors General are able to conduct their
important work effectively.
Thank you, and I look forward to answering any questions.
[Prepared statement of Mr. Horowitz follows:]
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Mr. Meadows. Thank you, Mr. Horowitz, and I want to thank
you for your continuing work. As you know, the Inspectors
General provide a critical role in a number of scenarios, and
it is always good to have you before this committee.
Ms. McGarry, you are recognized for 5 minutes.
STATEMENT OF BETH MCGARRY
Ms. McGarry. Thank you, Chairman Meadows, and thank you,
Congresswoman Plaskett and distinguished members of the
committee.
I am pleased to have this opportunity to discuss the Office
of Justice Programs' commitment to rigorous oversight of its
grants program and our collaboration with the Department of
Justice Office of the Inspector General and the Government
Accountability Office. These collaborations strengthen and
support OJP's grant oversight process.
I am Beth McGarry, the Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney
General for OJP. Prior to my service in this position, I was an
Assistant United States Attorney and a career Deputy Assistant
Attorney General at OJP.
Every day across the country, OJP grantees do amazing work,
preventing and controlling crime, administering justice, and
assisting crime victims. For example, two of our justice
reinvestment initiative States, Georgia and North Carolina,
have both reduced their prison populations and reinvested the
cost savings to add community probation and parole officers and
intervention and treatment programs.
We are honored to call the recipients of these 7,000 grants
partners, and we take very seriously our responsibility to be
vigilant stewards of taxpayer dollars as we manage the public
funds behind these grants.
Key to these efforts is OJP's Office of Audit Assessment
and Management, which was stood up in 2007. OAAM establishes a
stronger oversight structure for OJP's multi-billion dollar
grant programs. With congressional support and through OAAM's
leadership, OJP has implemented a robust framework of oversight
across its grants programs.
Congress also requires OJP to conduct comprehensive
monitoring of not less than 10 percent of total award dollars.
Demonstrating its commitment to this requirement, OJP
consistently exceeds this 10 percent level each fiscal year. In
fiscal year 2015, OJP monitored 20 percent of award dollars,
completing in-depth programmatic and financial monitoring twice
the amount required by law.
Given the magnitude of the oversight required, it is
essential that we focus monitoring efforts on grants where
there is the most risk to Federal resources. To accomplish
this, OJP uses a risk-based assessment and analytic approach to
oversight. This approach entails analyzing myriad criteria
during both the grant application and post award phases.
In addition, OJP developed rigorous monitoring standards
and procedures to ensure that grant awards are assessed, the
information collected is analyzed, and determinations made
regarding the grantees' performance on all programmatic,
financial, and administrative requirements of award.
OJP recognizes that we must consider potential risk before
individual grants are awarded. Last year, OJP implemented an
enhanced pre-award risk process. Based on this analysis, OJP's
program offices implemented actions to manage or mitigate and
identify potential risks to the Government by requiring
increased oversight and financial training.
Once awarded, OJP assesses grants against more than two
dozen risk factors and determines the appropriate monitoring
plan. At a minimum, each grant award undergoes a desk review
once a year. Informed by the annual desk reviews and quarterly
risk-based assessment, OJP conducts in-depth programmatic and
financial monitoring of selected grantees.
We are honored that the Association of Government
Accountants cited OJP's model as a best practice and that other
Federal agencies and the OIG have requested OJP's assistance to
replicate our risk-based model. For grants recipients deemed
high risk, OJP provides extensive monitoring and in many cases
intensive technical assistance. When warranted, we freeze
grantee funds or refer the grantee for investigation by the
OIG.
The OIG is a critical part of the Federal oversight
framework. OJP works as a liaison between the OIG and the grant
recipient to ensure that the findings identified in the OIG
audit reports are corrected properly. OJP also uses the audit
reports to strength our internal controls and grant monitoring.
Also we work with the GAO to strengthen our programs.
Preventing wasteful duplication in Government programs is a
critical priority for DOJ and OJP. The department's three
grantmaking components collaborate closely on the development
and implementation of grant programs. Each year, the grant
programs conduct an assessment to determine the risk of
overlap. Through this collaboration, we ensure that our tribal
grants are not duplicate but support complementary justice
purposes.
OJP values transparency in our grant operations. We have a
dynamic Web site, where we post all of our solicitations, grant
awards, the DOJ financial guide, and grant information.
I look forward to working with the subcommittee to ensure
that our programs and activities meet the high standards that
you expect of us and that the American people deserve. Thank
you again for this opportunity, and I look forward to your
questions.
[Prepared statement of Ms. McGarry follows:]
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Mr. Meadows. Thank you so much for your testimony, and
thank you for your service.
Ms. Goodwin, you are recognized for 5 minutes.
STATEMENT OF GRETTA GOODWIN
Ms. Goodwin. Chairman Meadows, Ranking Member Plaskett, I
am pleased to be here today to discuss GAO's work examining the
Department of Justice's grant program practices.
Grants are an important tool the Federal Government uses to
provide program funding to State and local governments. In
fiscal year 2016, it is expected that the Federal Government
will provide States and localities more than $650 billion in
grants to fund a wide range of public policies, some related to
criminal justice.
DOJ has three granting agencies, which provide grants that
support victims assistance, technology and forensics, juvenile
justice, mental illness and substance abuse, policing, and
other activities. My testimony today summarizes the progress
DOJ and its largest granting agency, the Office of Justice
Programs, or OJP, have made in addressing 17 recommendations
from earlier GAO studies.
I will highlight our key findings and the agency's efforts
to address them in the following three areas--DOJ's overall
grant administration practices, OJP's management of the
Bulletproof Vest Partnership Program, and OJP's management of
the Victims of Child Abuse Act grant program, or VOCA.
With respect to DOJ's overall grant management, in 2012, we
examined the extent to which overlap existed across DOJ grant
programs and whether that contributed to the risk of
unnecessary duplication, whether DOJ had taken steps to reduce
overlap and the potential for unnecessary duplication, and how
DOJ used monitoring and assessment to determine grant program
effectiveness, as well as how it used the results to enhance
its grant programs.
We found that DOJ had not assessed its grant programs to
identify overlap, nor had DOJ routinely coordinated grant
awards to avoid unnecessary duplication. We also reported that
DOJ could take steps to better assess the results of its grant
programs.
We made eight recommendations to DOJ to enhance its overall
grant administration practices. DOJ has implemented seven and
is making progress on the final recommendation related to
codifying new policies and procedures.
We also assessed how well OJP managed its Bulletproof Vest
Partnership Program, which I'm going to refer now as the body
armor program. In 2012, we examined the efforts OJP had
underway to support State and local law enforcement's use of
body armor, the extent to which there were controls in place to
manage and coordinate these efforts, as well as factors related
to body armor's use and effectiveness and the steps OJP had
taken to address them.
We found that OJP could enhance grant management controls
and better ensure consistency in its program requirements by
improving grantee accountability, reducing the risk of grantee
noncompliance, and ensuring consistency in its efforts to
promote law enforcement officer safety.
We made five recommendations to OJP to address each of
these areas. OJP has implemented all five.
Finally, in our assessment of OJP's management of VOCA
grants, in 2015 we reported on the extent to which OJP had
ensured the timely expenditures of VOCA grant funding and
assessed the performance of VOCA grantees. We found that OJP
had several administrative review and approval processes in
place that contributed to delays in grantees' ability to begin
spending their award funds.
We also found that OJP did not have complete data to assess
VOCA grantees' performance against the measures it had
established. We made four recommendations to OJP, and as of
this July, one has been implemented. OJP is making progress on
the three remaining recommendations, which relate to examining
its administrative processes and project length and
establishing and enforcing clear program requirements.
As you know, GAO annually conducts recommendation follow-
up. So we will continue to monitor the implementation of our
recommendations to DOJ and OJP.
Chairman Meadows, Ranking Member Plaskett, and members of
the subcommittee, this concludes my remarks. I'm happy to
answer any questions you have.
[Prepared statement of Ms. Goodwin follows:]
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Mr. Meadows. Thank you for your testimony, and thank you
for your service.
Mr. Sedgwick?
STATEMENT OF JEFFREY SEDGWICK, PH.D.
Mr. Sedgwick. Chairman Meadows, Ranking Member Plaskett,
and members of the committee, I'm pleased to have the
opportunity to speak with you today about the Department of
Justice's progress in improving the operations and management
of the Office of Justice Programs.
I say progress because, as you know from my resume, I've
intermittently worked in the Office of Justice Programs and its
predecessor--the Office of Justice Assistance, Research, and
Statistics--since 1984. Currently, I serve as the Executive
Director of the Justice Research and Statistics Association, a
national nonprofit association of analysts, researchers, and
practitioners throughout the justice system dedicated to
providing accurate and timely information in support of sound
policy development.
Created by the State Statistical Analysis Centers in 1974,
JRSA works closely with the Bureau of Justice Statistics and
other Federal agencies to promote the effective use of criminal
and juvenile justice information.
I have the somewhat unique perspective of having worked
within OJP to strengthen its management and then, after a lapse
of 6 years away from OJP, coming back to view it from the
outside as head of an organization that performs a significant
amount of research, training, and technical assistance
supported by OJP grants. That permits me to comment from my
present position on whether the management improvements
initiated 8 years ago have persisted and perhaps been extended,
judging, of course, from the perspective of an outside
observer.
Members of this committee may remember the management
challenges confronting OJP 8 years ago. Significant numbers of
expired grants that had not been closed out, with unexpended
funds reverted to the Treasury, questions about the integrity
of the grantmaking process and whether or not awards were
properly reflective of peer reviewers' scores of competing
proposals, concern over whether grants and contracts were
properly monitored and audited to assure performance and uphold
OJP's fiduciary responsibility to the American taxpayer, and
the lack of clean financial audits for OJP.
Upon my departure in January 2009, OJP had a clean
financial audit. The backlog of expired, but unclosed grants
was eliminated with all de-obligated funds properly reverted to
the Treasury. A process was instituted that assured any
deviation from peer reviewer scores in awarding grants were
clearly documented and justified by reference to publicly
announced criteria, and the Office of Audit Assessment and
Management was stood up, fully staffed, and headed by an
exceptionally talented and qualified leader.
Six years later, I returned to Washington to assume my
current position, giving me an opportunity to see OJP
management from the outside rather than the inside. I'd like to
share with you my observations and the inferences I draw from
them about the trajectory of management in OJP.
First, I notice a number of new features of the grantmaking
process which I heartily applaud. OJP now posts on its Web site
a funding resource center listing all upcoming, current, and
closed opportunities. This allows associations like mine to
plan ahead, assemble good teams, and write excellent proposals
to perform needed work on behalf of OJP bureaus.
I also notice that there is a considerable degree of
uniformity across solicitations issued by OJP bureaus with
common performance and reporting requirements, common scoring
criteria for proposals, and a common set of statutory and
financial management requirements. Equally pleasing to me is
the longer window of time between the issuance of a
solicitation and the deadline for proposal submission. Short
deadlines disadvantage newer and smaller organizations that
often have the most innovative ideas.
And I've noticed that OJP now routinely returns to each
applicant, successful or not, the peer reviewer's comments on
his or her proposal. In the past, applicants had to request
peer reviewer's comments, and they were often delayed as bureau
staff edited those comments.
In fairness, any organization that takes the time to write
a grant application deserves prompt and complete feedback on
their proposal so they have the opportunity to improve.
All of these changes encourage more applicants to apply and
increase the chance that taxpayer dollars will go to those with
the most innovative ideas and the strongest subject matter
expertise on their teams, a sign of good management.
Supporting these improvements in the application process is
a much more detailed and accessible grants management system
with an extensive online training tool providing step-by-step
guidance for meeting the OJP-specified reporting requirements
and making necessary adjustments to projects as they unfold
through the submission of grant adjustment notices.
The detailed online training offered to every grantee at a
time of their convenience is an enormous aid to grantees with
everything spelled clearly out through step-by-step
instructions. Again, a sign of good management.
And finally, I'd like to comment on a small change, but one
that says a great deal about the integrity of the current
grantmaking process in OJP. Since my return to Washington, I've
noticed something new. Bureau heads and program managers will
not meet with the head of an organization while a solicitation
is open to which the organization may respond with a proposal.
Every applicant plays on a level playing field whether they
hover on downtown, the beltway, or the heartland. No
preferential treatment, no insider access during proposal
writing. Again, a sign of good management.
As I commented at the beginning, I'm no longer in a
position where I can knowledgeably comment on the specific
management practices currently deployed in OJP, but I can make
inferences from what I observe as one who does business with
OJP on a now regular basis. My inference from what I have
witnessed these past 18 months is that the trajectory of
management improvement that I testified to previously in this
chamber in September 2008 continues, and I applaud those
responsible for carrying on in OJP a culture of continuous
improvement.
[Prepared statement of Mr. Sedgwick follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Meadows. Thank you so much for your testimony.
Thank each of you for your testimony, and I am going to
recognize the vice chair of the Subcommittee on Government
Operations, the gentleman from Michigan, Mr. Walberg, for an
opening statement.
Mr. Walberg. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I thank you for
holding this hearing about how we can bring much-needed
transparency and accountability to the Federal grantmaking
process.
This is a bipartisan issue, which is why earlier this year,
we passed my bill, the GONE Act, requiring Federal agencies to
take action to identify thousands of expired grant accounts,
which are costing the taxpayers millions of dollars.
I am pleased that legislation was signed into law, and that
took a step in the right direction toward responsibly managing
our grant accounts and eliminating wasteful spending. However,
this process and in this hearing process more work needs to be
done to make sure agencies are appropriately monitoring and
managing their grant accounts.
These grants open opportunities and provide important
resources to law enforcement and our communities. So we have a
duty to ensure these funds aren't being wasted and taking away
opportunities from other potential recipients.
So, again, Mr. Chairman, I appreciate the hearing, you
holding it even as others are leaving, and we have an
opportunity to finish some work that is good work.
Thanks much. I yield back.
Mr. Meadows. Well, I thank the gentleman from Michigan and
the ranking member for hanging with me on a fly-out day. You
can normally smell the jet fumes shortly on leaving, and so I
understand that you both may have other places to be, but we
really appreciate you being here.
So let me--I am going to recognize myself for 5 minutes for
a series of questions. Before I do that, I want to thank the
staff. You know, so many times, we ask questions, we look at
things, and good oversight really comes down to our staff and
how well they do it.
And we are about to leave for 7 weeks. They are so excited
about that, but I want to make sure that part of the record is,
is that we thank an incredible staff. Both on majority and
minority, the staffs do a great job in providing this.
Ms. McGarry, I want to come to you a little bit because we
hear a lot of glowing success stories, and yet I am a little
bit perplexed. We wouldn't be here today if everything was
rosy, and so I want you to help me understand a little bit
about what I mentioned in my opening statement about the
prisons that were opened, I guess, on Navajo lands.
I want to be the first one to be very clear. I have the
Eastern Band of the Cherokee Indians, who has enjoyed a grant
by your group, and a justice center in my home county. I am one
of the few Members that actually--in fact, maybe the only
Member that has a congressional office on tribal lands, and so
I enjoy an extremely good relationship with my Native American
constituents and yet recognize they are a sovereign nation as
well.
So this is not designed to really single this out as an
entity is more as, hopefully, an anomaly and how we can make
sure that it doesn't happen again if it is as bad as what I
read. And I guess, when did the prisons open?
Ms. McGarry. Chairman Meadows, thank you for your question.
The grant was funded in 2009, and the OJP and OIG are still
working to resolve these audit issues. And we rely heavily on
the OIG's intensive, in-depth audits. And whenever issues are
brought to our attention, we take action.
And, in fact, in the next several weeks, members of OJP
leadership are going out to the Navajo Nation to meet with the
Navajo leaders to discuss an agreement that will satisfy the
OIG's concerns, but also meet the criminal justice needs of the
Navajo Nation.
So this audit is still--we're still resolving the issues
with the OIG, but we take this matter very seriously, and we
look forward to our continuing dialogue with the IG.
Mr. Meadows. Well, I appreciate that. So when did the
prisons open?
Ms. McGarry. Chairman Meadows, I'm going to have to get
back to you on the exact date. I believe that the Tuba City
facility opened last year, and the Kayenta facility is just
waiting one last construction permit for it to open, a water
cooler ----
Mr. Meadows. So one of them is open, one of them is not. So
the one that is not open, I would assume it has no inmates in
it?
Ms. McGarry. Not until it has the final certificate of
occupancy.
Mr. Meadows. So what is the monthly occupancy of the one
that is open?
Ms. McGarry. Chairman, I'm going to--I will have to get
back to you on the exact occupancy. I know that the Navajo
Nation ----
Mr. Meadows. Average occupancy. I mean, plus or minus two
inmates?
Ms. McGarry. I can't give you those specifics. I'll have to
get back to you. I know that the Navajo Nation is working
closely with the Bureau of Indian Affairs to hire and train
staffing to be fully operational.
Mr. Meadows. Oh, so it is not operational?
Ms. McGarry. I mean, it's operational, but I mean, to be at
full capacity. It's--I know--I know it's not at full capacity,
but I don't know the exact number.
Mr. Meadows. Okay. Because the numbers I have would suggest
that it is far from full capacity. So the one that opened up,
how many beds does it have?
Ms. McGarry. I don't have the specifics of their ----
Mr. Meadows. Mr. Horowitz, can you help illuminate some of
those questions for me?
Mr. Horowitz. I believe, and I could find it, I think,
here, it's about 80 or so beds, if I recall correctly, 80 to 90
beds.
Mr. Meadows. All right. So the one that is open is the
smaller of the two facilities.
Mr. Horowitz. Yes. And our numbers that we last received,
it appeared that it had about 82 percent vacancy rate at the
point we last heard about it, which was probably towards the
end of last year, early this year. In terms of its occupancy,
only 2 of the 11 parts of the facility at that point were yet
opened.
And part of the issue being, as Ms. McGarry said and one of
the criticisms and concerns we had, is the way the Federal
Government has set up these facilities, the Justice Department
funds construction through their grants, but the Interior
Department funds the staffing or a portion of the staffing. And
if those two agencies aren't ----
Mr. Meadows. That is a real problem.
Mr. Horowitz. It is, and it was here. We found that if
those two agencies don't have robust dialogues with each other,
a facility can be built that is far too big for what staffing
either for its needs, as we thought here, but just generally,
even moving away from this facility in particular, one that BIA
can't afford to--the Bureau of Indian Affairs can't afford to
staff.
Mr. Meadows. Well, so the whole scenario ``If you build it,
they will come'' is not necessarily true in this situation, as
it relates to both inmates and people to actually have the
facility staffed. Is that correct?
Mr. Horowitz. That's correct.
Mr. Meadows. So--so, Ms. McGarry, and I am going to close
and go to the ranking member here, and we will have another
round of questions. But I guess my concern is, is as we have
this--and I understand your statement that you are taking it
seriously.
But with the lack of specificity with regards to, you know,
it is almost like we have this unbelievable outbreak of crime
on the Navajo facility that we start to build these huge
facilities that we can't staff and we don't have enough inmates
for them, how can we feel good about the process of the grant
being given if, one, they're not finished, and we will get to
$32 million of, I guess, money that is out there.
I mean, do you see a real systemic problem with our
process, or is this it just happened that somebody who was
managing it on this particular case failed to do what they were
supposed to do?
Ms. McGarry. Well, Congressman, there have been two
intervening laws that have increased the criminal jurisdiction
for the Navajo Nation.
Mr. Meadows. Yes, I am very aware of those. Like I say, I
have got Native American tribes in my area, and they actually
lobbied for some of that. But it doesn't necessarily translate
into additional inmates. It possibly would, but it doesn't
necessarily.
But those two laws wouldn't indicate that we should build a
facility that is two and a half times what the grant was made
for, would it?
Ms. McGarry. In this particular case, we consulted research
from the National Institute of Corrections about planning
correctional facilities for the future, recognizing that if
there's intervening laws that greatly increase the criminal
jurisdiction of a tribal community that you are to recognize
that and to not build facilities that will last 20 years.
Mr. Meadows. So, Mr. Horowitz, would you agree with that
analysis?
Mr. Horowitz. I think it's obviously fine and smart to plan
for a 20-year period.
Mr. Meadows. Sure.
Mr. Horowitz. I think the issue from our standpoint was the
building size is so disproportionate to what the current inmate
population was and, frankly, still is once the prison is now
open that, consistent with the master plan that was actually in
place at the time at the Navajo Nation from 2007-2008, that
master plan has proven to continue to be--look quite accurate
and, in fact, that was a document that should have been
followed.
Mr. Meadows. So, so they adjusted the master plan that they
started with. I guess you adjusted it after the laws were
passed, thinking that it was going to change.
Ms. McGarry. Yes, sir.
Mr. Meadows. Okay. And you do see that was an error at this
point?
Ms. McGarry. We're still working through these issues with
the IG.
Mr. Meadows. Okay. Well, I will come back because I see it
has a major error, and if that is going to be your testimony,
we have got a little bit deeper dive to go into. You know, it
is one thing to make a mistake. It is another to ignore a
mistake and not admit that you have it. And I guess if your
statement is, is that you think that the jury is still out on
this, we will come back to that.
I am going to recognize the ranking member for a gracious 9
minutes if she needs it.
Ms. Plaskett. Thank you.
I want to thank you all for being here today and for the
information that you are sharing with us.
Ms. McGarry, I know that OJP has experienced some of those
challenges that we are here talking about, and I understand and
it appears from the testimony that improvement in your
management processes are taking place. Can you verify the
amount of closures in fiscal year 2015 of the amount of single
audits and IG audit reports that were done?
Ms. McGarry. Thank you, Ranking Member Plaskett, for your
question.
On those specific examples, I will have--the numbers, I
will have to get back to you. But ----
Ms. Plaskett. I have a listing of 208 single audits and 23
IG audit reports, which means the closure and implementation of
620 recommendations.
Ms. McGarry. Yes. I recall that that is our figure for last
year.
Ms. Plaskett. Okay, Mr. Horowitz, it is good to see you
again.
Mr. Horowitz. Good to see you.
Ms. Plaskett. And although I know that our staff are really
happy for us to be gone for 7 weeks, I don't know about the
district staff, how they feel about, you know, us being there
for 7 weeks now.
Mr. Meadows. It is not vacation.
Ms. Plaskett. Right, right, right. So is it true that out
of the 54 recommendations your office made in the 6 audits
being highlighted here, OJP has closed 44 and resolved 8. So
leaving only two recommendations unresolved?
Mr. Horowitz. I don't have the precise numbers with me,
Congresswoman, but those numbers wouldn't surprise me
generally. I think that what we found is we generally work with
OJP to resolve our recommendations when they come out, and we
have found that with many of the recommendations that they move
forward and have closed them. And we work with them to try and
address the remaining audits because as--open recommendations.
Because as Ms. Goodwin noted with GAO, we also continue to
do regular follow-ups with OJP and make sure that that happens.
Ms. Plaskett. How long do those take for the closing out of
those audits, the recommendations being implemented?
Mr. Horowitz. It depends. The vast majority get closed
within, I would say, 2 to 3 years.
Ms. Plaskett. Two to 3 years? Is that a small--is that
quick, or is that long?
Mr. Horowitz. I think from our standpoint, we hope to close
all recommendations out within 1 to 2 years. So once
recommendations remain open for 2 years or longer, they start
becoming a concern to us. And one of the things that we've done
starting last year was post on our Web site all unimplemented
recommendations, all open recommendations.
So the public can see essentially an aging report of our
open recommendations. And since we have posted that, there has
been considerable follow-up in the department, including
through the leadership of the Deputy AG's office to try and
move some of those to closure.
Ms. Plaskett. Do they always agree with the recommendations
you are making and then implement them, or are there instances
where they are like, ``No, we don't agree with you, and we are
not going to implement that.''
Mr. Horowitz. During my tenure in the 4 years I've been
here and my understanding from my predecessor, it was rarely
the case and it has been rarely the case where we have not
agreed. The Navajo Nation audit is one where there are open--
from our standpoint, open, unresolved recommendations. And we
are continuing the dialogue with OJP to try and move towards a
resolution process.
Ms. Plaskett. Okay. And Dr. Goodwin, I know that the GAO
reports, they are not audits. But is it true that DOJ has
implemented about 13 of the 17 recommendations your agency has
made to DOJ regarding department-wide and OJP-specific grant
administration?
Ms. Goodwin. Yes. That's correct. The report we issued in
2012, that had eight recommendations, and as of this July,
they've closed seven. There is one, the final one they are in
the process of getting us the documentation so we can--we hope
to close that out soon. But we don't close anything out until
we've done our own review.
Ms. Plaskett. So every year, approximately how many audits
or recommendation--reports do you do for OJP?
Ms. Goodwin. I don't have the exact numbers on that, but we
are continuously, you know, being asked to look at OJP
programs.
Ms. Plaskett. Okay.
Ms. Goodwin. So it's quite a few.
Ms. Plaskett. And since I get a little more time, the audit
of the DNA Backlog Reduction Program, I was hoping to discuss
that one. According to the IG's office, OJP requested that this
audit be done to better ascertain the extent to which grantees
were accurately reporting and using program income as well as
how the National Institute of Justice could better manage the
program.
Ms. McGarry, is that an accurate representation of how the
audit and why the audit was initiated?
Ms. McGarry. Yes, Congresswoman. And this is a great
example of our collaborative working relationship with the OIG.
We looked at the program income of the DNA grant program and
saw that we thought there were issues and that we would rely on
the expertise of the IG, who has forensic auditors that we
don't have to come in and help us examine this issue.
Ms. Plaskett. Great. I think that shows that, you know, OJP
is being proactive in terms of its own management and oversight
of its programs, and the audit produced valuable results.
Although it only looked at a narrow sample of four grantees, it
found that NIJ could do a better job of identifying grantees
with the potential for generating program income and working to
ensure that grantees understood how to calculate income and use
it appropriately.
And I think that is important because too often we leap to
the conclusion that individuals who are not fulfilling the
requirements are doing so because they are seeking to break the
law, as opposed to it being individual and grantees simply not
understanding the requirements that are put on them by taking
the grant.
Would you say that that is correct in some instances?
Ms. McGarry. I would say that that is correct, and in fact,
as a follow-up to the OIG's review, our Office of Audit
Assessment and Management is doing a comprehensive program
assessment of program income, and we've already put
instructions into the solicitation to applicants to clearly
provide that guidance that they need.
Ms. Plaskett. Well, I am going to ask you, for my own
purposes, for my own district, I know that the Virgin Islands
has had a very difficult time with OJP and with the kinds of
grants that they have been given, fulfilling it in the audits
that they have, and it has really held up them moving forward
and being able to provide assistance to the people of the
Virgin Islands.
And I understand that there has been quite a bit of
discussion within our local agencies that have management and
oversight over that to be able to get beyond what was in the
past. Everyone has said that it had a lot to do with the
technical support really providing the kind of compliance and
management that they needed to have to fulfill the requirements
of those grants.
Do you find that you have resources and individuals who
follow the grant from the beginning to the end? Because I think
that one of the problems we have seen in the Virgin Islands is,
is that they want to do the right thing. They have been
audited, but the auditors change. And so they have a new person
who then has to go and review all of that all over again.
What are you doing regarding that?
Ms. McGarry. For the Virgin Islands, we work closely with
the IG. The recommendations came out of an IG audit, and that's
where the role of the Office of Audit Assessment and
Management, they provide that consultation and close work with
the staff in the Virgin Islands, and they have made great
progress over the last year resolving their issues.
And then we work as the liaison between the Virgin Islands
public safety staff and the IG to resolve and close those
recommendations.
Ms. Plaskett. Okay. Thank you very much.
Thank you for your indulgence, Mr. Chairman. You are such a
great guy.
Mr. Meadows. Well, you are very kind. Can you write that
down for me? No.
[Laughter.]
Ms. Plaskett. It is on the record.
Mr. Meadows. Oh, thank you. Thank you.
I recognize the gentleman from Michigan, the vice chair of
the Subcommittee on Government Operations, Mr. Walberg.
Mr. Walberg. Great guy, yes.
[Laughter.]
Mr. Walberg. Two hours ago, my wife texted me a picture of
her holding our new 10-month-old granddaughter in her arms that
she met at the airport in Detroit, and she is spoiling her
right now while I am in this meeting. And so we will vote that
later, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Horowitz, good to see you again. You discussed in your
testimony the importance of monitoring grants to ensure that
recipients fulfill whatever obligations or conditions they
agreed to in the first place. Could you expand on it a little
bit more how that takes place? Give us a sense of what your
work has shown you about OJP's monitoring of grantees and their
projects.
Mr. Horowitz. Thank you, Congressman.
What we have seen is, is as a general matter, OJP doing a
fine job in ensuring that the reports they get back demonstrate
the money that was distributed was used, generally speaking,
for the purpose of the grant. The problems we find are when we
go out and learn that those reports aren't necessarily accurate
that are coming back, and we find problems behind the
reporting.
But what we're finding isn't done systemically at a level I
think should be done is reporting back on performance measures,
on not just is the money being used for the purpose it was
sent, but what's the result of that investment by the
Government and the taxpayers in the program?
The example I like to cite to was a program where OJP gave
out--and this is a few years ago now, but I think the example
is still relevant--monies to two local police departments to
buy drones.
Mr. Walberg. Buy drones?
Mr. Horowitz. Buy drones.
Mr. Walberg. Okay.
Mr. Horowitz. And in fact, the drones were purchased. No
issue about a misuse of funds. They bought the drones. The
problem was the two departments had not gotten the FAA
certificates and other regulatory approvals they needed to
actually use the drones.
And so when we went out, we determined that, yes, they used
the funds per the grant. There was nothing improper about their
use of the funds. But from a taxpayer standpoint, the drones
never flew. They were never used.
And so an investment had been made by the taxpayers, used
by the local police as required, but after the fact, they could
never get them out.
Mr. Walberg. No outcome, yes. Okay.
Mr. Horowitz. And that's an example of the kind of
measurement you really want to get to. You want to get past was
there a fraud or a misuse to, hopefully, there isn't, and then
what was the value in return.
Mr. Walberg. I guess, following up, Ms. McGarry, do you
believe that OJP is adequately monitoring these grants? We have
just heard this testimony. Do you see additional layers in your
monitoring process that you can add?
Ms. McGarry. Thank you for the question.
We're very committed to improving our monitoring process,
and each year, we evaluate the recommendations from the OIG and
the GAO to make those changes. And in fact, we are focusing
very closely on measuring the success of our grants to ensure
accountability of results.
The Office of Audit Assessment and Management has stood up
a business process improvement to look OJP wide through all the
grant components to assess their performance measures and the
progress reporting, and they're in the process--the business
process improvement team is in the process of making
recommendations. And we hope to implement to make our
monitoring of performance more robust.
Mr. Walberg. Give me an idea of what, at least as far as
the draft so far of these proposals, what are some of those?
Ms. McGarry. I have not seen the draft recommendations. I
think they're still being developed. But I'm happy to get--to
come back to the committee and share those recommendations when
we receive them.
Mr. Walberg. I would assume it would be in the field seeing
exactly if the drone is flying, for instance, if the license
hangs on the wall?
Ms. McGarry. Oh, we have made absolutely specific changes
around the purchase of drones. Now we put in standards and
procedures in place immediately after receiving that report
several years ago, and no law enforcement agency can purchase
an unarmed aerial system without direct approval from the BJA
director, and it must be accompanied by an FAA certification
for operation.
Mr. Walberg. Okay. I yield back.
Mr. Meadows. I thank the gentleman, and I hope he makes it
very quickly to hold that 10-month-old grandbaby. So we are
going to do a second round as time permits here, and so I will
recognize myself.
So let me follow up just a little bit on some of the other
information that we had because Mr. Sedgwick was talking about
the progress that we have made and how from an outsider's point
of view and from an insider's point of view we have seen some
real progress. And so as I looked at that, you were nodding,
and I was seeing that smile on your face that we can all
applaud.
One of the concerns that continues to keep coming up in
this, this particular testimony is that you keep referring to
the audit that the IG does. And as much as an audit is
appreciated and as much as I rely on those, and Mr. Horowitz
can tell you that I comb over them with great detail. And so as
much as we start to rely on that, my concern really gets in
terms of the internal controls, the ones that Mr. Sedgwick was
talking about that we made great progress. In terms of
performance, a performance matrix and saying, okay, we made the
right decision and these are the right things that have
happened, do you have that in place, and is that significant?
And I guess what I would like to say is in a perfect world,
those performance matrix on what is there and what needs to be
there, maybe to have you, Ms. McGarry, tell me what is there,
and then Ms. Goodwin and Mr. Horowitz comment on what you would
like to see. So I will start with you.
Ms. McGarry. Chairman Meadows, we have, as you heard, put
many agency-wide standards, procedures, and internal controls
to prevent and catch any problems, and we look at the continuum
of the grant process. As I said, we've put in pre-award risk
analysis to try to prevent problems, require financial training
for new grantees that often are the ones that have trouble
following the rules.
We also have programmatic monitoring with recommendations.
And the Office of Audit Assessment and Management follows up on
all those recommendations.
Mr. Meadows. And I guess I understand that, but that is not
qualitative necessarily. You know, that is, again, it can be
just a check of the box. We have checked with the going out,
and they said, you know, we have got the drones, and we are
working on it.
What I am looking for is something that is more qualitative
and quantitative perhaps in its measuring where you can, for
lack of a better word, you can get a score that it is a 9.2 on
compliance, and I don't expect that. But something that is--so
do you see my point?
Ms. McGarry. Absolutely. And that is a very good question,
and we have begun to make those changes. In our in-depth
programmatic and financial monitoring, we are requiring on our
review to look at source documentation and not just take the
word on a report, but to dig down and look at the source
documentation and do that verification.
This year, the Office of Audit Assessment and Management is
setting up a quality review process to also dig in on these
internal monitoring to make sure that, indeed, what is being
reported is true from the grantees.
Mr. Meadows. All right. Ms. Goodwin, what would you look to
see from a GAO perspective?
Ms. Goodwin. I'll speak to the VOCA grant funds that we
looked at.
Mr. Meadows. Right.
Ms. Goodwin. And of those recommendations, three are still
open.
Mr. Meadows. Right.
Ms. Goodwin. And so if we think about one of the
recommendations we made has to do with the 12-month project
period length and some of the difficulties and challenges the
grantees were having in kind of just getting their awards and
starting to engage in those activities.
So before a grantee can actually get the award, they have
to be--OJP does this review process that takes about 2 months.
Mr. Meadows. Right.
Ms. Goodwin. And so that's 2 months of the 12 year--I'm
sorry, of the 12 months that a grantee has to kind of engage in
their activities.
So when I mentioned that it was delaying a grantee's
ability to kind of get their funds and then start engaging in
those activities, the internal--the internal stuff that needs
to happen at OJP is affecting a grantee's ability to really
engage and do activities related to their grant funds. Since
it's a 12-month period, 2 months are already gone.
Mr. Meadows. So what you are saying--so what you are saying
is the delay at OJP in terms of decisions that are made cuts
into their 12-month window of deploying that grant?
Ms. Goodwin. Exactly.
Mr. Meadows. Okay. And you would agree with that, Mr.
Sedgwick, from an outsider. Now I know you get grants. So I
know you are going to be cautious on how you respond to this.
You know, I found the ironic nature of somebody witnessing on
somebody who is making the decision, but go ahead.
Can you hit your mic?
Mr. Sedgwick. Yeah, I actually coincidentally just finished
writing my last grant proposal this cycle on Monday night at
11:59 p.m. So a lot of this is fresh in my mind.
There are, for example, in the proposal I just completed,
pretty clearly the first 4 months of a 2-year grant are going
to be spent not actually working on the grant, but actually
kind of getting in place all of the agreements and all of the
clearances and so on.
Mr. Meadows. To make sure she is happy?
Mr. Sedgwick. Yes. Now I will say one of the things in this
proposal that I think speaks to the issue you're raising
because I think the way I would phrase what you're asking a
question about is it's one thing to ask people for outputs.
It's another thing to ask them for outcomes, and I'd push it
even further and then say, and what are the impacts?
That is, you know, the output, presumably, affects people's
behaviors in a positive direction, and that's an outcome. But
then you have to ask the further question, if we improve the
behavior of a bunch of people in the community, what's it do
for the overall health or wellness of the community?
And what I particularly--I think there's still some kind of
areas for improvement in terms of clarifying that progression
of outputs, which everybody is familiar with; outcomes, which
people are getting more familiar with; but still the next step
is the impacts.
What I will give OJP tremendous credit on in this most
recent proposal that I worked on that was very large was the
emphasis, and I think this will get to the question you were
raising, an emphasis on we had to link goal--a problem to a
goal, to an objective, to a task, and then to a deliverable.
And it was over and over again in that RFP that those
deliverables had to be quantifiable.
Mr. Meadows. Okay. Thank you.
Mr. Horowitz, what about you?
Mr. Horowitz. Well, I think that is a big part of it, what
Mr. Sedgwick just mentioned, which is in the upfront, early in
the process understanding what's the outcome that we are
looking to achieve? If it's a grant related to reducing
truancy, not measuring not just how many children have you put
in the program, but what was the impact on truancy in the
school, in the community?
What measurements are you going to require the grant
recipient to send to you? Because that's really what is
required here. What goes on throughout this process is the
inflow of information that's required of a grant recipient to
OJP. That starts OAAM and other entities at OJP to look at
that, and when they see anomalies, they'll often call us.
But it's all because of the inflow of information that's
demanded or required, pursuant to the grant. So it really
starts right up front.
I'll add one other part, one other issue to the discussion,
which I think is important in that we're looking at in our
ongoing review of the department's oversight of violent crime
efforts that it has, and that is how are the three grantmaking
components of the Justice Department coordinating with other
law enforcement components at the Justice Department on the
efforts to deliver to local law enforcement? Are those getting
coordinated?
Because that's another concern we've had is it looks as
though, generally--this is a general statement. But the
question that we're asking is, is the grantmaking that's going
out to the local--State and local law enforcement, which
obviously is partnering with Federal law enforcement ----
Mr. Meadows. Right.
Mr. Horowitz.--and the FBI and DEA and ATF and Marshals, et
cetera, is there coordination going on within the Justice
Department itself over how best to deal with and serve law
enforcement needs at the local level? And so that's another
issue.
Mr. Meadows. And so you are saying that is not happening?
Is that happening, Ms. McGarry?
Ms. McGarry. Well, certainly ----
Mr. Meadows. To the extent that it needs to happen. How
about that? I will give you a qualifier.
Ms. McGarry. Well, we share that goal of having
coordination.
Mr. Meadows. I understand that.
Ms. McGarry. And we are doing it.
Mr. Meadows. Is it happening or not?
Ms. McGarry. Yes. In the Violence Reduction Network ----
Mr. Meadows. Really?
Ms. McGarry.--the grant components are working side by side
with the DOJ law enforcement.
Mr. Meadows. And so you have how it affects violent crimes
and how it--the outcomes? So we would like to have a copy of
that because I haven't been able to find that.
Mr. Horowitz, what am I missing?
Mr. Horowitz. We're in process of the audit. So I would
probably be ----
Mr. Meadows. So you are saying that you actually have that,
Ms. McGarry?
Ms. McGarry. Through ----
Mr. Meadows. Because it is like building a school and
educating someone and not having whether they get a job or not.
That is the analogy that I make is that if we are going to
invest this kind of dollars and we are--whether it is drug
intervention or juvenile violence or abuse or any of those, we
can do a lot of great programs. But if it doesn't stop what we
are trying to stop, then it is just money that is being spent.
It is like going to university and ending up coming back,
driving a taxi cab because you can't get a job because of the
degree you get. Do you follow me?
Ms. McGarry. Absolutely. And we share your goal. And as Mr.
Sedgwick said ----
Mr. Meadows. So do you have--do you have the matrix to be
able to figure out whether we are doing that?
Ms. McGarry. We've put the matrix in the solicitation, and
our business process improvement work we're doing is how can we
better capture that to tell that complete story.
Mr. Meadows. Okay. So will you commit to this committee
that in the next 120 days that you will look at what you have
put in, what Mr. Sedgwick just had to put his grant proposal in
for, in terms of a way for you to monitor this going forward?
And let me--this all comes back to what we see is the
Navajo issue. And my big concern there is, as a fiscal
conservative, I get beat up every time I give money for grants,
and I have defended you. I have defended Department of Justice
on a number of grant operations as a fiscal conservative.
But any time that we build two prisons 75 miles apart that
really are not being occupied and really don't have--unless you
are going to ship in Federal inmates from outside the Navajo
territory, it is going to be very hard to fill it up. I mean, I
know the numbers, and I know what it is in my district, and you
are going to be shipping in inmates to fill up something that
you didn't have to build and that we have got a $32 million
excess. Do you see the problem?
Ms. McGarry. We certainly are taking this issue seriously.
Mr. Meadows. So you don't see it as a problem?
Ms. McGarry. I see it as an issue that we're still in the
process of working with the IG and the Navajo Nation to
resolve.
Mr. Meadows. Okay. Here is my--and I am going to be nice. I
want to go home, and you seem like a real nice individual. And
so I am going to be a little bit perhaps indirect in my
suggestion.
We need within a 60-day timeframe for you to get back to
this committee on how you are going to resolve the outstanding
issues with the IG. And I don't mean that ``We are taking it
serious, and we are working hard.'' I mean a real plan on how
we are going to get this resolved.
Because it inherently undermines the potential for future
grants and future funding if this is believed to be across all
of your grantmaking capability. And here your sworn testimony
today is this is isolated, and you are committed to getting it
worked. Is that correct?
Ms. McGarry. We are committed to resolving these issues.
Mr. Meadows. And this is isolated?
Ms. McGarry. In my--this is an anomaly that we are working
through.
Mr. Meadows. All right. I recognize the ranking member for
a series of questions.
Ms. Plaskett. Thank you.
Dr. Sedgwick, you have done some enormous work in this area
and have a vast amount of experience with OJP. I wanted to talk
with you about the arduous process for applicants that has in
the past and there has been some discussion about the lack of
transparency. And if we want the best programs to apply for OJP
grant dollars, we must have a process that is completely fair.
Now you talked in your testimony about the improvements
that you have seen regarding detailed online training and
releasing unedited peer review comments and et cetera. You have
also testified about that in your tenure, the Office of Audit
Assessment and Management was created. Can you tell us why this
office was created?
Mr. Sedgwick. I think to get at a lot of the questions that
you all have been asking today. These are not new questions.
The whole notion--you know, the Office of Justice Programs
distributes a very large amount of money to law enforcement and
to public safety in all its various manifestations in the
United States. And there's always questions about was that
money appropriately used, and did it have the intended effect?
So this is--you know, these are not new issues. These have
always been there, and I think they always will be there. And
so that's why in my written statement, I ended with a comment
about the importance of a culture of continuous improvement
because I think, you know, during my tenure and my experience
in OJP and its predecessor, OJARS, the organization has come a
long way.
But there's always going to be challenges, in part because
the nature of the problems that OJP is trying to address are
constantly changing. I'm kind of struck by when I was in the
Bureau of Justice Statistics in 1984, the only thing anybody
cared about were the FBI index crimes. So you really worried
about seven crimes.
I'm away for 22 years. I come back to BJS in 2006, and all
of a sudden, people are talking about Internet crimes against
children and human trafficking and a whole set of crimes that,
quite frankly, nobody even thought about in 1984. And so, you
know, you've got an agency that is grappling with an ever-
changing mix of what constitutes illegal behavior in the United
States.
At the same time that that's going on, so it's trying to
chase a moving target, the bar is being raised. And I think OJP
has been--has worked very hard at raising its own performance
and moving along that continuum that I mentioned earlier where
in the old days, you only monitored outputs.
Now we're well into the era of monitoring outcomes in terms
of, all right, you ran this many people through your program,
how did you move the needle? Tell me what improvement looks
like, and how does that get measured?
And I think now we're on the cusp of people beginning to
say, well, okay, if we change the behavior of X number of
citizens in a community, what's that do to make that community
better, safer?
We toss around the phrase ``community wellness,'' but I
think that has to be taken very seriously. How is the community
qualitatively improved as a result of the programs that are
being funded by the Office of Justice Programs?
Ms. Plaskett. And is that what the Office of Audit
Assessment and Management ----
Mr. Sedgwick. Very much was part of helping--first of all,
helping applicants understand their responsibility in terms of
measuring the effectiveness of what they were doing and
reporting it to OJP. Then also helping OJP use that information
that they were receiving from the field to say, all right, how
is this particular grantee performing? Okay. They've got a
great proposal, looks good, but is the needle moving, and how
would we know, right?
And I think that's--you know, I think that's a very
important part of what the purpose of the Office of Audit
Assessment and Management was. I can remember, I was in BJS
when that agency actually first got authorized and stood up,
and kind of taking a whole set of bureaus within OJP and
getting them to accept the idea that this Office of Audit
Assessment and Management was going to kind of get them to
adopt a common set of performance measures was a bit of a
chore.
I mean, if you go way back to my beginning, 1984, before
the reauthorization of the Justice Department, in 1984 every
one of the bureaus in what is now OJP was by statute completely
independent, except for one thing. The Assistant Attorney
General had to approve your press releases, but everything else
you could do on your own.
So part of what you're kind of looking at and the kind of
challenge is overcoming a culture, now you might say that's 32
years ago, but in organizations and bureaucracies, 32 years is
like saying before lunch today, right? I mean, for us, it seems
like a generation, but in organizational terms, a lot of
organizations, 32 years is the blink of an eye. And it takes a
lot of work to move a culture of an organization like OJP,
where you have a history of autonomy and get people to
cooperate, right, and to work together.
Ms. Plaskett. And you feel that it is moving that way?
Mr. Sedgwick. Absolutely. I don't have any doubt at all.
Ms. Plaskett. Okay, thank you.
Mr. Sedgwick. Yes.
Mr. Meadows. The chair recognizes the vice chair of the
subcommittee, Mr. Walberg.
Mr. Walberg. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
There was a gun buyback program, PSN--Philadelphia Safety
Net program. And in that program, the policy was to give away
$100 gift cards in exchange for guns. However, hundreds of the
gift cards went missing, and the sole employee and executive
director of PSN reportedly used grant money to pay for personal
things like parking tickets, hotel stay, gasoline purchases,
clothing, restaurants, meals, and cash withdrawals.
And so, Ms. McGarry, did OJP know before PSN gun buyback
program was concluded in March of 2012 that funds were being
misspent?
Ms. McGarry. Well, we've put several agency-wide standards
and procedures in place to catch these type of problems. And we
became aware of the issues, and our prevention mechanisms now
are this grantee was an earmark and now would be put through
the pre-award risk. And as a new grantee and as a small
nonprofit would be required to do financing training to prevent
these type of problems.
Mr. Walberg. But did you know before it was concluded that
the misspending had taken place?
Ms. McGarry. I'm not personally aware. I believe that we--
our managers did not know the extent of the problem.
Mr. Walberg. Has there been any check to find out why the
managers didn't know that there was a problem?
Ms. McGarry. Yes. And that's part of our continuous
improvement. We've enhanced our grant manager training. We've
added questions for programmatic managers about financial when
they're going out, to give them checks to look more deeply into
financial conditions of grantees. So that is part of our
continuous improvement. Always learning from these
irregularities and issues and making changes to help prevent
them in the future.
Mr. Walberg. Feel pretty confident now that an entity like
that with basically one sole manager of the program, executive
director, with this much money is detected hopefully before --
--
Ms. McGarry. Yes. I think the measures of our pre-award
risk assessment, intensive oversight of this type of a grantee
would be--would be solid to detect and prevent these problems.
Mr. Walberg. Mr. Horowitz, what was OJP's oversight like
throughout that program as you looked into it?
Mr. Horowitz. Well, we obviously saw a series of concerns
there in the way the funds were being used, the lack of
controls matching up, the gift cards that were given out with
the firearms that were being purchased. In fact, there are
still unaccounted for numbers of gift cards because there were
more gift cards given out than there were guns collected.
Mr. Walberg. Guns brought in.
Mr. Horowitz. One of the things particularly concerning to
us was that the executive director of the agency received
almost $350,000 in compensation awarded by his sister, who was
the chairman of the board.
So those kinds of self dealing conflicts, lack of controls
over program obviously ----
Mr. Walberg. Would that have been expected as normal to see
that if you saw that type of relationship, brother and sister
running a program with that much money attached to it, handing
out gift cards, over $300,000 salary? Should that have been
something that would have been sniffed out very quickly?
Mr. Horowitz. It's certainly something that if not done
quickly, given the lapse of time, certainly we would have hoped
that at some point along the way that those kinds of controls
that were lacking in a place like PSN would have been
identified sooner.
And again, part of this goes to reporting back on results.
What were the results of this audit? Well, if the executive
director is taking a third of the money or so for himself, then
there is a problem with the program.
Mr. Walberg. At what point during the process would PSN
have reported to OJP what it was spending the money on? I ask
that of Ms. McGarry.
Ms. McGarry. Each grantee has to submit a quarterly
financial report, and in that report, they would designate what
the money was being spent for. And this is one of the
improvements we've put in place is to not just rely on these
reports, but to have our managers look for source documents
through the process.
Mr. Walberg. And stay on top of it? Okay.
Ms. McGarry. We're trying.
Mr. Walberg. Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
Mr. Meadows. I thank the gentleman.
This has been a good hearing. I want to just thank each of
you for your time. We have a few ``to dos'' that are out there,
and Ms. McGarry, I would encourage you strongly to work with
Ms. Goodwin and Mr. Horowitz in terms of those measurable
matrix that I talk about, performance standards, how we can
make sure.
You have such a kind way of coming back that it makes a guy
like me actually have empathy for you, and I guess that is a
good thing. So it is--but in doing that, I want to underscore
the seriousness of some of this, and I would love to come and
visit with your sub-agency and thank your workers for the job
that they do.
It is real easy when we start to focus in on these problem
areas to suggest that everything is awful, and we didn't hear
that today that everything was awful. I think we heard some
real things that concern us. And what concerns me is not just
with the hard-working American taxpayer dollar that we are
looking at in this $32 million discrepancy.
What concerns me is the long-term viability of a grant
program that I see a real need in, that has been benefited my
constituents, and that if we allow these kind of things to
happen and continue to happen, that the money will go away.
Because they are going to use the Navajo example or perhaps the
buyback program example, and they are going to paint a broad
brush.
And what that means is that there will be individuals
without protective body armor perhaps, if there were not the
right amounts of money spent. And so to put it in perspective,
and I really want you--we have made a commitment here to work
on these two outstanding issues with Mr. Horowitz and his team,
but I want to put it in perspective.
When we look at increasing something 250 percent. So we
went from the original design, we expanded it 250 percent based
on a couple of jurisdictional areas that should not increase
the inmate population that much. It is like building--
originally setting out to build the Capitol, this facility, and
instead building Nationals Stadium and then building Nationals
Stadium again.
So do you see why it really creates a real problem? The
numbers are going to have to--I am going to continue to follow
up, and I want to hear back from you, as we have suggested.
But again, I want to thank all of you for your testimony,
and if there is no further business before the committee, the
Committee on Government Operations stands adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 3:41 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]
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