Internal Audit

The overseas drug war has been poorly managed and given low priority by the State Department, according to a scathing internal audit. The department's Bureau of International Narcotics Matters, which has spent more than $600 million since 1979, is characterized in the 44-page audit as "a cycle of below-average Foreign Service personnel, doing a poor job of managing an expensive program with little to show for it. " The critique by State Department...

A South Philadelphia company used an elaborate scheme involving phony bids, forged documents and dummy corporations to win plumbing contracts from the Philadelphia Housing Authority, according to an internal audit of PHA's procurement practices. The audit, dated Jan. 15 but not made public until Monday, alleged that the "scheme" was designed so emergency plumbing and heating repairs would be funneled to Plumb-Town Inc. of South Philadelphia. Over a seven-month period in 1990 and 1991, the PHA awarded contracts worth more than $375,000 to Plumb-Town, the audit said.

As an employee of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia, Anita Guzzardi, was considered a trusted servant of the church. Once, she headed an office that tried to restore the faith of strayed Catholics. In her time off, she liked to play the slots at the Borgata casino in Atlantic City and to take vacations, using her American Express card. And for years, Guzzardi paid those credit card bills by checks from the archdiocese - nearly $1 million in all, according to sources familiar with a continuing investigation by the Philadelphia District Attorney's Office.

The former executive director of the authority that operates the Delaware Memorial Bridge and the Cape May-Lewes Ferry took flights and used his official credit cards for apparent personal purposes at a cost of more than $326,000 to the agency, according to the findings of an internal audit. Michael E. Harkins, who had run the Delaware River and Bay Authority for 10 years until he was forced out in March, also failed to submit receipts for $18,000 in cash advances, the bistate agency said yesterday in releasing the findings of an internal audit.

Kristen Noe could well be described as the very model of self-control. Noe, 22, of Audubon, held a clerical job at the Dale Tile Co. in Mount Laurel. One of her responsibilities, according to Sgt. Jack Smith, spokesman for the Burlington County Prosecutor's Office, was to deposit the company's receipts. But during the waning months of 1993, according to an internal audit, some of that money never made it to the bank. Company officials called Mount Laurel police, who in turn arrested Noe and charged her with stealing $160,961 worth of checks.

An investigation by the state auditor general of the North Penn School District's finances blamed mismanagement and "extremely poor judgment" on the part of district officials for the loss of more than $1.65 million in reimbursements, interest earnings, and future state funding, a report released yesterday said. The report, prepared by the office of Auditor General Robert P. Casey Jr., also said the district paid nearly $200,000 above market value for investment transactions. In addition, the report was critical of an arrangement to provide dental- and vision-care benefits to employees of the School Districts Insurance Consortium under the district's health plan.

College football's winningest program just took another hit off the field. The University of Michigan released embarrassing details of an internal audit yesterday that discovered Rich Rodriguez' team failed to file forms tracking how much time players spent on football during the 2008 season - his first - and the offseason last spring. Perhaps coincidentally, the NCAA and the school are investigating the program about similar issues. The NCAA sent the school's president a notice of inquiry last month, saying it plans to complete its investigation by Dec. 31. "I don't know what the NCAA is going to find," athletic director Bill Martin said in an interview with the Associated Press yesterday, before the audit was released.

THE CITY controller's Valentine's Day gift to the school district came in the form of an audit report questioning its ability to survive. Gerald Micciulla, a deputy city controller, pointed to the district's budget shortfalls and said there's uncertainty "about its ability to achieve cost savings and obtain additional funding to overcome" them. "These conditions raise substantial doubt about its ability to continue as a going concern," he wrote. That one line in the district's internal audit of its books for the 2010-11 fiscal year could make it more expensive to borrow money.

An internal audit found that the school district has been wrongly paying for the health insurance of up to 140 employees, misspending hundreds of thousands of dollars a year. Personnel director Marvin Hopkins, who caught the errors in his audit, projected the district will save $366,000, about 9 percent of the budget, until the fiscal year ends in June. In the next budget, the board will account for the overpayments by reducing the size of insurance allocations. Employees whose benefits were cut were sent letters informing them that they no longer were covered but could get insurance through the district by paying for it themselves.

The director of the Camden Parking Authority resigned yesterday amid allegations of impropriety after she took more than $2,300 in unauthorized overtime pay and other benefits. Barbara J. Broadwater, a longtime political ally of Mayor Randy Primas, submitted a three-paragraph resignation letter to authority chairman George E. Norcross 3d Thursday evening, saying that her decision to resign, effective yesterday, was made "to assure the continued revitalization of Camden. " Her resignation came more than two weeks after it was discovered that she had paid herself overtime and cashed in unused sick leave and vacation days without the approval of the authority's five commissioners.

THE CITY controller's Valentine's Day gift to the school district came in the form of an audit report questioning its ability to survive. Gerald Micciulla, a deputy city controller, pointed to the district's budget shortfalls and said there's uncertainty "about its ability to achieve cost savings and obtain additional funding to overcome" them. "These conditions raise substantial doubt about its ability to continue as a going concern," he wrote. That one line in the district's internal audit of its books for the 2010-11 fiscal year could make it more expensive to borrow money.

As an employee of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia, Anita Guzzardi, was considered a trusted servant of the church. Once, she headed an office that tried to restore the faith of strayed Catholics. In her time off, she liked to play the slots at the Borgata casino in Atlantic City and to take vacations, using her American Express card. And for years, Guzzardi paid those credit card bills by checks from the archdiocese - nearly $1 million in all, according to sources familiar with a continuing investigation by the Philadelphia District Attorney's Office.

College football's winningest program just took another hit off the field. The University of Michigan released embarrassing details of an internal audit yesterday that discovered Rich Rodriguez' team failed to file forms tracking how much time players spent on football during the 2008 season - his first - and the offseason last spring. Perhaps coincidentally, the NCAA and the school are investigating the program about similar issues. The NCAA sent the school's president a notice of inquiry last month, saying it plans to complete its investigation by Dec. 31. "I don't know what the NCAA is going to find," athletic director Bill Martin said in an interview with the Associated Press yesterday, before the audit was released.

An audit of Chester County Prison's finances has uncovered what auditors called "hidden" accounts that collected $18,000 from inmates from 1984 through 2003. All but $4,000 was "spent at management's discretion over the years," Ray E. White Jr., acting Chester County controller, wrote yesterday in a letter accompanying the audit of the "inmate fund," which holds personal money for inmates to spend in the prison canteen or to send back home. That fund handled $1.1 million in 2003, the audit said, and had a balance of $82,000 at the end of last year.

The former executive director of the authority that operates the Delaware Memorial Bridge and the Cape May-Lewes Ferry took flights and used his official credit cards for apparent personal purposes at a cost of more than $326,000 to the agency, according to the findings of an internal audit. Michael E. Harkins, who had run the Delaware River and Bay Authority for 10 years until he was forced out in March, also failed to submit receipts for $18,000 in cash advances, the bistate agency said yesterday in releasing the findings of an internal audit.

In a rare show of solidarity at an otherwise raucous caucus, many council members sided with Mayor Paula M. Brown and asked for an internal audit of the benefits given former police Sgt. Richard A. Galli, who resigned last weekend while facing charges in two criminal cases. The probe was prompted by Brown's assertion that Galli got advance pay last year for 40 sick days, leaving him with none for 1998. But his record, she said, reflected 59 sick days left in 1998 - now depleted to 31. She added that since he was suspended without pay on April 30, he had been been paid $20,365.

An internal audit found that the school district has been wrongly paying for the health insurance of up to 140 employees, misspending hundreds of thousands of dollars a year. Personnel director Marvin Hopkins, who caught the errors in his audit, projected the district will save $366,000, about 9 percent of the budget, until the fiscal year ends in June. In the next budget, the board will account for the overpayments by reducing the size of insurance allocations. Employees whose benefits were cut were sent letters informing them that they no longer were covered but could get insurance through the district by paying for it themselves.

Attorney General Mike Fisher yesterday petitioned Chester County Orphans Court to order Lincoln University to perform a forensic audit of its spending for the last 11 years, Fisher's spokesman, Sean Connolly, said. "We want an accounting of every penny in and every penny that went out," Connolly said. "We asked the Orphans' Court to direct them to comply. " The accounting could be the most exhaustive look yet into spending at the southern Chester County school, which has been reeling in recent months from allegations of financial improprieties.

An investigation by the state auditor general of the North Penn School District's finances blamed mismanagement and "extremely poor judgment" on the part of district officials for the loss of more than $1.65 million in reimbursements, interest earnings, and future state funding, a report released yesterday said. The report, prepared by the office of Auditor General Robert P. Casey Jr., also said the district paid nearly $200,000 above market value for investment transactions. In addition, the report was critical of an arrangement to provide dental- and vision-care benefits to employees of the School Districts Insurance Consortium under the district's health plan.

The New Jersey Attorney General's Office has found no evidence of criminal conduct at Cooper Hospital-University Medical Center following a two-month review of a hospital-commissioned audit, state officials announced yesterday. Attorney general's spokesman Chuck Davis said investigators from the Division of Criminal Justice had completed a review of the 400-page internal hospital audit that outlined millions of dollars fraudulently taken from the institution since 1988. The broad-based audit examined various financial controls, including contracts and bidding practices at the hospital.