Finding Text
31 C.F.R. § 35.4(c), Reporting and Requests for Other Information, states during the period of performance, recipients shall provide to the Secretary or her delegate, as applicable, periodic reports providing detailed accounting of the uses of funds. The Ohio Department of Public Safety, Office of Criminal Justice Services (OCJS) Standard Federal Subgrant Conditions Handbook, Chapter 4: Corresponding and Reporting Section states that all OCJS projects are required to submit Quarterly Subgrant Reports (QSR), which shall be submitted on the last day of the month following the calendar quarter end. Additionally, this Handbook states that a report must be submitted every quarter, even when there have been zero expenditures or if a payment is not being requested. The Sheriff's Department did not have internal control procedures in place regarding Federal grant reporting for the Retention Incentive and Operating Clean Up grants. Quarterly reports were due the last day of the month, following quarter end and were not on file for the Retention Incentive Grant for the first and second quarters of 2024. The only QSR was submitted in 2024 for the Retention Incentive grant covered the first 3 quarters of 2024 and it also reported corrections for the 2023 expenditures previously reported, created on October 28, 2024, and then modified on November 27, 2024. Additionally, the quarterly report was not filed for the 1st quarter and Quarterly reports were not submitted timely for Quarters 2 through 4 for the Operation Cleanup Grant. The Sheriff's Department reported both of these grants in the same county fund even though separate quarterly reports were required. As such, we were unable to determine which grant certain disbursements related to and therefore were unable to determine if individual grant quarterly reports agreed to the underlying ledgers. We did note differences when comparing the sum of the two grants reported expenditures each quarter to the underlying accounting system. We noted a variance between total reported expenditures compared to the county ledgers which resulted in an overstatement of $10,915 in reported expenditures. Further, Municipal Court did not have internal control procedures in place regarding Federal grant reporting for the Violence Reduction grant. The Court did not file quarterly reports for Quarters 1 or 2 in 2024 but instead filed only one final report for the period ending September 30, 2024 which was due by October 31, 2024, but filed on December 13, 2024. Failure to submit the required reports timely to the pass-through entity could result in material noncompliance and potential loss of future funding. The Sheriff and Municipal Court offices' should establish internal control procedures to help ensure all required reports are submitted timely and based on actual information from underlying accounting ledgers.