Report Contents
Summary of Review
The purpose of this Management Assistance Report is to facilitate the closure of open, unclassified Office of Audits recommendations with significantly overdue compliance responses by bringing them to the attention of the Under Secretary for Management (Under Secretary). As of May 6, 2021, 15 unclassified Office of Audits report recommendations— made to 4 Department of State (Department) entities that have not responded to Office of Inspector General (OIG) inquiries concerning the status of actions to implement those recommendations—remain open, and a response from the Department entity was overdue by 150 days or more.1
The recommendations concern deficiencies related to the Department’s travel card program; Special Needs Education Allowance (SNEA) voucher approval; mechanisms to track the total number and cost of physical security projects in Kabul, Afghanistan; inadequate financial reporting for assistance to the Philippines; inaccurate and incomplete oversight of countering violent extremism (CVE) programs; and noncompliance with the Foreign Affairs Manual (FAM) for aircraft valuation.
According to the FAM, the Under Secretary, as the Department’s audit follow-up official, is responsible for ensuring that timely responses are made to all OIG recommendations and that, regardless of implementation responsibilities, corrective actions are taken.2 Therefore, OIG provides monthly reports on open OIG recommendations to the Under Secretary.
To facilitate closing the remaining 15 outstanding recommendations, OIG made 2 recommendations to the Under Secretary. Based on management’s response to a draft of this report, OIG considers one recommendation to the Under Secretary closed and the other resolved, pending further action. OIG will close the open recommendation to the Under Secretary when it receives evidence that justifies the closure of each recommendation discussed in this report. A synopsis of management’s comments to the recommendations offered and OIG’s reply follow each recommendation in the Conclusion section of this report. Management’s response to a draft of this report is reprinted in its entirety in Appendix A. In addition, after issuing a draft of this report, OIG received responses from the 4 bureaus responsible for the 15 recommendations3 discussed in this report. On the basis of those responses and the documentation provided, OIG was able to close 4 of 15 recommendations.
1 These 15 recommendations from 6 reports reflect only those open, unclassified recommendations with responses that are overdue for 150 days or more. (See Table 1.)
2 1 FAM 044.1(10), “Responsibilities.”
3 Of the 15 recommendations, 4 have been closed with the issuance of this report. Specifically, the closed recommendations include: AUD-FM-20-33, Recommendation 9 to the Bureau of the Comptroller and Global Financial Services; AUD-FM-20-33, Recommendation 12 to the Bureau of Medical Services; and AUD-MERO-19-39, Recommendations 11 and 13 to the Bureau of Counterterrorism and Countering Violent Extremism.
Report Terms
Report Recommendations
OIG recommends that the Under Secretary for Management (a) direct all Department entities responsible for implementing the recommendations identified in this report to provide OIG, within 30 days of the issuance of this report, with a status update, including evidence of actions taken, descriptions of actions planned or still to be completed, and estimated milestones for implementation for each recommendation and (b) verify that each entity has responded as directed.
OIG recommends that the Under Secretary for Management verify periodically, but no less than quarterly, that those entities with recommendations that have yet to be implemented and closed are providing status updates and responses to OIG in a timely manner, as required.