Why have a fraud hotline?

This is why. I don't think this happens often, but sometimes an anonymous hot line is the only way to find out. Nothing establishes tone at the top like action taken when unethical behavior is detected.

Opaque Transparency

I have written before about transparency and how that is translated into action. In one post, I cited the Government Accountability Office’s report on transparency. To reiterate, transparency is the public’s access to information. I have also written about the presentation of information recently when I compared EPA web information to the New York Times handling of very similar information. Thinking about the citizen point of view is important to designing the presentation.


Today there was commentary in the Oregonian about the opaqueness of government transparency as it is currently delivered on http://www.recovery.gov/ . The GAO has now started to audit transparency. See page 33 of this report. They note as positive that the Office of Financial Stability on its http://www.financialstability.gov/ site has added a usability survey to help them improve the quality of their transparency. The GAO itself uses a similar survey when you search their website and I have to admit I have seen steady improvement in their website and its usability.

Communicating audit findings

This reminds me of what you have do to translate audit findings into a report. LOL

Transparency via the New York Times

I frequently admire graphics in the New York Times. And, I wish many times that audit reports could communicate as clearly. Sometimes I even use ideas I find in the Times to design an illustration for a report. For example this map illustrates my point. The NY Times compiled data on facilities that have permits to discharge pollutants and responses from states regarding compliance and entered it into an interactive map. You can enter your zip code and learn what facilities are near you and the number of violations they have had.

There is much talk now in government about increasing transparency. The federal government has launched http://www.recovery.gov/ to track stimulus funds and we have http://www.usa.gov/ that serves as a gateway to government information including a page of links to government data sources. But flooding citizens with data is not necessarily transparency.
The EPA has a similar feature to the NY Times map that is referenced on its main page. You can enter your zip code and access "MyEnvironment." Here you will have access to information about environmental quality in your area. There is a map with sites that report to the EPA. But the only information for each site is the name and address. It lacks what is of most interest to a citizen - the number of violations. I tried to probe further to see if with more investigation I could find this out at the EPA site but it proved impenetrable to me. Maybe if I had searched more industriously I might have found the information. But you have to admit that a citizen probably would not be as determined.

Four graphs say it all

I continue to admire the NY Times graphics. Here are four graphs that collectively explain why health care reform is necessary. We should try for similar visualization in our audit reports. We could communicate quickly and effectively. What if an audit report was only two pages, one with graphs and the other with recommendations.

Sometimes you just happen upon something

Blogs can lead to interesting places. I started with NYTimes Freakonomics blog. That led to a blog that I hadn't seen yet called frumination. I followed the link because we are currently conducting an audit of transportation outcomes and this link was about what would be the effect if there were no subways in New York. The author of the frumination blog took data available from the Metropolitan Planning Organization of New York (an organization required for federal transportation funding) to do his/her analysis. Another blogger took the data and visualized it in another way. This shows the power of making data available and transparency.

Truly strange

I have worked as a local government auditor for three different governments for the past nineteen years. Governments always struggle with the administration and management of contracts. Every audit that examines contracting always will find room for improvement. But this is as bad as it gets. Jefferson County, Alabama is unable to determine how many contracts it has that are current. Lacking adequate controls, they also don't have a contract compliance officer or an internal auditor. Faced with a budget crisis, the local County commissioners don't have accurate information to make decisions.

But even stranger, this news account, just four days later describes another crisis in the city of Birmingham, Alabama, the County seat. The City Council is requesting an audit from the Alabama State Auditor's Office to determine how much money the City has in the bank. The mayor claims the City will end the year with a $13 million surplus, but the City's financial accounting software shows the City is running a deficit.

Two great audit areas - contracts and the accuracy of financial information.