Finding 1062053 (2024-002)

2024-002 U.S. Department of Education Pass-Through Illinois State Board of Education Education Stabilization Fund 84.425U COVID-19 American Rescue Plan- Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ARP-ESSER) Fund Federal Award Year: 2024, 2023, 2022 Finding: The District has insufficient reconciling processes for reporting the Education Stabilization Fund expenditures. Criteria: Title 2 U.S. Code of Federal Regulations Part 200, Uniform Administrative Requirements, Cost Principles, and Audit Requirements for Federal Awards Section 200.303 Internal Controls states: “The non-Federal entity must: (a) Establish and maintain effective internal control over the Federal Award that provides reasonable assurance that the non-Federal entity is managing the Federal award in compliance with Federal statutes, regulations, and the terms and conditions of the Federal award….” Condition: The expenditures reported to the Illinois State Board of Education for the ESSER III award did not agree to the District’s general ledger. Context: The District reported total program expenditures for year-end audit and to the Illinois State Board of Education as $378,735. The District provided general ledger detail for the program as of June 30, 2024, for $414,820. Effect: Federal awards are not properly reported to the state and the District is not ensuring federal expenditures incurred and amounts awarded are reconciled for timely reimbursement. Questioned Costs: $0 Identification as a repeat finding: This is a repeat finding. Cause: The District does separately code program expenditures on the general ledger. The District does not prepare monthly monitoring reports by program to ensure program expenditures, revenues, and reports are reconciled. Recommendation: We recommend the District code all expenditures charged to the program to a specific project code. If the District identifies costs initially charged to a non-program code, we recommend the District record adjustments to move the expenditures. We recommend the District require the submissions to the Illinois State Board of Education by reconciled by the Business Manager prior to the Superintendent submitting. We recommend the Business Manager monthly prepare a reconciliation to monitor the total award, the expenditures incurred, the totals reported to the state, and the amount received from the state. The report should incorporate a comparison of the award budget to actual to ensure any required budget adjustments are made before the next submission. Response and Corrective Action Plan: The District will review current processes for identifying, coding and reporting federal expenditures and implement processes to ensure amounts reported are supported by the District’s general ledger.