OPA released its semi-annual Audit Recommendations Tracking Report for the period ending June 30, 2005. Audit recommendations tracked for the first six months of 2005 totaled 70. Of the 70 audit recommendations, 1 was closed and 69 remained either open or resolved. Of the 69 open or resolved recommendations, 24 were considered delinquent.

OPA's follow-up on outstanding audit recommendations and the response letters received from various government agencies resulted in the closure of one audit recommendation and encouraged agency action on delinquent recommendations. OPA closed 1 of the 70 recommendations it tracked in the first six months of 2005. The number of delinquent recommendations decreased by 20% as of June 30, 2005.

A review of the one recommendation closed during the first six months of 2005 showed that the closure was a result of the agency implementing the decision of an arbitration panel that upon judicial review, was upheld by the Superior Court.

Recommendations issued by private CPA firms are also included in OPA's audit recommendations tracking report. OPA is not responsible for tracking the implementation of these recommendations, however, they are included in the audit tracking report for information purposes. Based on th e classification followed by private CPA firms, a recommendation is described as either resolved or unresolved. OPA has included in the tracking report a total of 88 recommendations in 8 recent audit reports issued by private CPA firms under contract by OPA.

As of June 30, 2005, recommendations in 11 audit reports were referred to the Attorney General's Office for legal action to recover monies improperly expended. According to OPA's audit reports, approximately $2,678,712 is potentially recoverable. In addition to this, potential recovery of another $3.7 million also hinges on agencies' actions.

Recommendations in 9 audit reports identified potential recoveries due to unpaid rentals of land leases, uncollected labor processing fees, overpayments in professional services contracts and retirement benefits, and improper expenditure of public funds. In OPA's Audit of Controls Over the Nonresident Worker Application Process issued on June 6, 2005 [AR-05-02], OPA identified potential recovery of $512,410 in uncollected labor processing fees. OPA recommended that the Department of Labor recover these uncollected fees from Company A and Company B. Therefore, the balance recoverable which hinge on agencies' actions as of June 30, 2005 is now $3,728,319.

In accordance with statutory restrictions in the Auditing and Ethics Acts, the names of individuals and entities in the audits are not disclosed in this report.

View/download copy of the Audit Recommendation Tracking Report