Finding Text
Finding 2025-005 – Private Attorney Involvement (Significant Deficiency and Non-compliance) Information on the Federal Program: Legal Services Corporation (LSC) Basic Field Grant, Disaster Project Grant, Disaster Grant Incurred Cost, and Technology Innovation Grant - FAL # 9.601037 Criteria: Title 45 CFR §1614 requires a recipient to devote an amount of LSC funding equal to at least 12.5% of their annualized LSC basic field award to promoting the involvement of private attorneys, law students, law graduates, or other professionals to provide legal information and legal assistance to eligible clients. Condition/Context: During our testing of PAI expenditures, calculated the required amount of expenditures that should be allocated to private attorney involvement and noted that LSA did not meet the minimum requirement. LSA applied for and received a waiver from LSC, but LSA did not add the correct prior year carryforward amount to the calculation. Cause: LSA failed to add the correct prior year carryforward amount to the PAI calculation. Effect: The Organization did request an adequate waiver amount. Questioned Costs: None reported Recommendation: We recommend the Organization increase efforts to meet the 1614 minimum such as expanding PAI training and education as well as community outreach programs. LSA could also re-evaluate existing activities to determine if activities already being performed could qualify as PAI activities. Views of Responsible Officials: Management agrees with this finding. See Management’s View and Corrective Action Plan included at the end of the report.