2025-003 Eligibility Finding Type: Significant deficiency in Internal Controls over Compliance and Compliance Federal Program Title and AL Number: The Food Distribution Cluster (10.565, 10.568, 10.569). Criteria: Per Title 7 CFR § 247.8, to apply for or to be recertified for CSFP benefits, the appli...
2025-003 Eligibility Finding Type: Significant deficiency in Internal Controls over Compliance and Compliance Federal Program Title and AL Number: The Food Distribution Cluster (10.565, 10.568, 10.569). Criteria: Per Title 7 CFR § 247.8, to apply for or to be recertified for CSFP benefits, the applicant or caretaker of the applicant must be informed of his or her rights and responsibilities, in accordance with § 247.12, the local agency must ensure that the applicant or caretaker signs the application form. Condition and context: As part of our eligibility testing, and in order to determine compliance with the requirements, we verified that the CSFP participants had completed and signed applications or recertifications prior to receiving food distributions. For four out of 32 non-statistical samples, the application was completed but did not have the participants' signature. Cause: The Food Bank did not have controls in place to ensure the participant signatures were received prior to providing food assistance to the individual. Effect: The Food Bank was not able to demonstrate compliance with Title 7 CFR § 247.8. Questioned Costs: None Repeat finding: No Recommendation: We recommend the Food Bank implement controls to ensure CSFP applications and recertifications are signed by the applicant prior to the individual receiving food. Views of responsible officials and planned corrective actions: Management concurs with the finding and recommendation. Please see the attached corrective action plan. Management Response and Planned Corrective Action: Criteria: Per Title 7 CFR § 247.8, to apply for or to be recertified for Commodity Supplemental Food Program (“CSFP”) benefits, the applicant or caretaker of the applicant must be informed of his or her rights and responsibilities, in accordance with § 247.12, the local agency must ensure that the applicant or caretaker signs the application form. The Los Angeles Regional Food Bank (“Food Bank”) has submitted a request to “Oasis Insights”, the Food Bank’s software vendor utilized for CSFP, to reinstate mandatory field validation, or a “hard stop”, on CSFP applications to prevent case progression or assistance issuance when required signatures have not been captured. The Food Bank will verify that the mandatory field validation feature has been reinstated. Additionally, the Food Bank’s CSFP Program Manager will ensure that all Food Bank employees responsible for overseeing CSFP will be provided with retraining in the area of CSFP eligibility requirements. The Director of Compliance and Administration will verify that CSFP applications through Oasis are unable to progress forward without a required signature and that the aforementioned CSFP eligibility training has been completed. The Food Bank will complete these corrective actions on or before June 30, 2026. Individuals responsible for corrective action: Elizabeth Cervantes – Sr. Director of Product Acquisition and Agency Relations 323.974.0073 Hilda Ayala – Sr. Director of Programs and Policy 323.353.0114 Steven Meisberger – Chief Financial Officer 323.318.0319