Finding Text
FINDING REFERENCE NUMBER 2024-030 FEDERAL PROGRAMS (ALN – 93.489; 93.575 AND 93.596) CHILD CARE AND DEVELOPMENT FUND CLUSTER (ALN – 93.489; 93.575 AND 93.596) COVID-19 – CHILD CARE AND DEVELOPMENT FUND CLUSTER U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES AWARD NUMBERS G2301PRCCDT (Federal Award Years: 10/1/2022 through 9/30/2025) G2001PRCCC3 (Federal Award Years: 10/1/2019 through 9/30/2025), G2001PRCCDX (Federal Award Years: 01/19/2019 through 9/30/2025), G2101PRCCC5 (Federal Award Years: 12/27/2020 through 9/30/2025), G2101PRCDC6 (Federal Award Years: 10/1/2020 through 9/30/2025), G2101PRCSC6 (Federal Award Years: 10/01/2020 through 09/30/2025) ADMINISTRATION ADMINISTRATION FOR THE CARE AND COMPREHENSIVE DEVELOPMENT OF CHILDREN (ACUDEN, BY ITS SPANISH ACRONYM) COMPLIANCE REQUIREMENT ELIGIBILITY TYPE OF FINDING INTERNAL CONTROL – SIGNIFICANT DEFICIENCY CRITERIA According to the 45 CFR sections 98.20(a) state the child’s eligibility requirements for child care services as following: (a) To be eligible for services under § 98.50, a child shall, at the time of eligibility determination or redetermination: (1) Be under 13 years of age; or, (2) At the option of the Lead Agency, be under age 19 and physically or mentally incapable of caring for himself or herself, or under court supervision; (3) Reside with a family whose income does not exceed 85 percent of the State's median income (SMI), which must be based on the most recent SMI data that is published by the Bureau of the Census, for a family of the same size; and (4) Whose family assets do not exceed $1,000,000 (as certified by such family member); and (5) Reside with a parent or parents who are working or attending a job training or educational program; or (6) Receive, or need to receive, protective services, which may include specific populations of vulnerable children as identified by the Lead Agency, and reside with a parent or parents other than the parent(s) described in paragraph (a)(3)(i) of this section. (i) At grantee option, the requirements in paragraph (a)(2) of this section may be waived for families eligible for child care pursuant to this paragraph, if determined to be necessary on a case-by-case basis. (ii) At grantee option, the waiver provisions in paragraph (a)(3)(ii)(A) of this section apply to children in foster care when defined in the Plan, pursuant to § 98.16(g)(7). STATEMENT OF CONDITION For a sample selected of forty (40) items from a population size of 15,466 participants for the performance of the Eligibility Test, we found the following conditions: 1. For one (1) participant the program could not provide the Birth Certificate to support and validate the child age required for eligibility purpose. 2. For one (1) participant we found that the Eligibility Certificate issued by the program was not signed by the Technician or the Coordinator for eligibility reviewing procedures purpose. 3. For twenty-three (23) participants which were beneficiaries of the Child Care through the Cares Act funds, we noted that the Eligibility Certificate issued does not provide to include the Coordinator signature for eligibility reviewing procedures purpose. QUESTIONED COSTS None. PERSPECTIVE INFORMATION This is a systemic deficiency in internal controls. During the participant eligibility determination test, which consisted to verifying the participants compliance with eligibility requirements, and the verification of the eligibility internal control in place for the assurance of the participants eligibility compliance, we noted the deficiencies established in the condition section. The sample was statistically valid. STATEMENT OF CAUSE 1. The program coordinator indicated that due to the data migration from the CIMA system to the ACUDEN Digital platform and the lack filing documentation, the Birth Certificate was missing to be provided. 2. For missing signatures in the Eligibility Certificate, the program indicated that there was no verification procedure performed for this case. 3. For the Coordinator reviewer signature exclusion in the Eligibility Certificate for the Child Care service through the Cares Act funds, the program indicated to us that this occurred due to the rapid spending funds procedure implementation. The program started to spend the funds as soon as possible and this reviewing signature was not incorporated as part of the Eligibility Certificate. POSSIBLE ASSERTED EFFECT The poor internal controls implementation could result in improper eligibility determination, increasing the risk of noncompliance and that may result in an improper use of funds. In addition, potential recipients of CARES Act funds may also be affected. IDENTIFICATION OF REPEAT FINDING This is a repeat of a finding reported in the prior audit as Finding Numbers 2023-009/2023-037. RECOMMENDATIONS We recommend ACUDEN strengthen internal controls to ensure complete and accurate eligibility determination considering all the participant information at all eligibility determination stages of the process.