NCJ Number
219394
Date Published
June 2006
Length
49 pages
Annotation
In response to the more than $600 million received by States in 2005 under the Community Services Block Grant (CSBG) supporting antipoverty agencies, this report attempts to provide a better understanding of the efforts that the Department of Health and Human Services’ (HHS), Office of Community Services (OCS) and states have undertaken to oversee the use of CSBG funds.
Abstract
Report highlights include: (1) in its efforts to oversee States, the Department of Health and Human Services’ (HHS’), Office of Community Services (OCS) lacked effective policies, procedures, and controls to help ensure that it fully met legal requirements for monitoring States and Federal internal control standards; (2) OCS also lacked a process to assess States’ Community Services Block Grant (CSBG) management risks; (3) OCS did not issue reports to States and annual reports to the U.S. Congress on monitoring visits; (4) OCS did not meet internal controls standards; (5) of the five States visited, only Illinois and Texas conducted at least one onsite visit to each local agency between 2003 and 2005; (6) OCS targeted some training and technical assistance funds to local grantees with financial and programmatic management problems, however with limited results; and (7) OCS did not have adequate information to determine whether its training and technical assistance programs and the amounts allocated were appropriate for addressing the greatest needs of local agencies and the State agencies. Several recommendations are presented in order to provide better oversight of State agencies. In 2005, the CSBG provided over $600 million to States to support over 1,000 local antipoverty agencies. The OCS is primarily responsible for overseeing this grant. At the request of the U.S. Congress, the Government Accounting Office (GAO) was requested to provide the following information on (1) HHS’ standards in overseeing States, (2) five States’ efforts to monitor local agencies, and (3) Federal CSBG training and technical assistance funds targeted to local agencies with problems and the results of the assistance. Appendixes I-VI