Finding Text
Finding 2023-002 – U.S Department of Housing and Urban Development – Housing Voucher Cluster – Program Documentation (Material Weakness)
Criteria: The Uniform Guidance requires that HALC maintain proper documentation to demonstrate compliance with the requirements of the program.
Condition: HALC was unable to provide the necessary documentation to support the following Housing Voucher Cluster compliance requirements:
•Special Tests:
o Housing quality standards enforcement
During our procedures over the population of housing quality standards enforcement, auditor noted there were only 2 failed inspections. Upon further inspection and inquiry, it was determined that inspection staff were improperly trained and were going back into the original inspection file and changing the fail to a pass which overwrites the fail in the system. Since an accurate sample could not be provided, the auditor passed on testing the enforcement requirement. The auditor observed failed and corrected enforcement activity within sample files selected for other procedures.
Cause: The Authority experienced a high degree of personnel turnover from 2020 through 2022. HALC’s Executive Director who had many years of HUD experience retired in December 2022 and personally performed several duties related to the Housing Choice Voucher program, as well as the Authority experiencing several housing assistant staff turnovers annually. Along with experiencing a high degree of personnel turnover, the Authority also experienced insufficient staffing levels overall.
Effect: The HAP payment related to the HQS enforcement participant could be disallowed. Since the population is unknown, questioned costs cannot be calculated.
Identification of Repeat Finding: This is not a repeat finding from prior year.
Recommendation: The Authority should:
• Strengthen the training available to staff that are responsible for determining and documenting compliance with each of the compliance requirements.
• Strengthen the review process of tenant files by management so that errors will be identified prior to payments being made to landlords on the tenant’s behalf.
• Train additional members of management and staff to perform and back-up the compliance duties related to the Section 8 program.
Views of Responsible Officials and Planned Corrective Action Plan: There is no disagreement with these findings. Management has taken steps to remedy the errors. HQS training with the Authority’s software provider and the housing staff has been scheduled. The training will be recorded for access by future staff and as a reference source for current staff. The training will be incorporated into the Authority’s procedures manual.