Taxpayer Dollars Gone Wild: Michigan’s Millions Missing in Action

0:00So the nonpartisan office of the auditor general here in the state of Michigan identified significant deficiencies in oversight from the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services to the Michigan Public Health Institute and There are lawmakers that say there are serious concerns about transparency and accountability of the state management of taxpayer Resources in these departments. Let's talk about it with representative Ann Blon the chair of the House Appropriations Committee representative It's good to have you back great to be back. Good morning. Thank you for having me of course So let's talk about this new audit and and what what does it show Well, it shows that you know, we have an accountability and transparency problem here in the state of Michigan With our governmental Administration through the state department under the executive branch namely in the Department of Health and Human Services in these contracts to the Michigan Public Health Institute

1:01and It shows that Material conditions and their independent audit things like no vetting of subcontractors No checking of reports to see if the expenses were actually paid just signing off on invoices and paying out and we're not talking You know 100 to $200 or even a hundred or two hundred thousand dollars We're talking about millions of dollars that are funneled through this organization this agency with no accountability They hire administrative right then is allowable under the contracts and again not by one or two percent by over 10 percent so the approved rates 4.9 percent They're allowing 17.5 percent in admin costs Over a million dollars in travel and training to these subcontracts This is a serious deficiency in the oversight through the Department of Health and Human Services You know, nearly 70% of the financial reports with you

2:03Reportedly lack supporting cost documentation. How does that happen on this scale without somebody inside the department? Raising a lot I I do not know and that is why we have asked for you know, I've held appropriations committees joint committees with oversight Turned it over to our oversight committee to take a deeper dive and this is before this audit came out there with a question I'm just what the level of accountability reliability trustworthiness And you know, I have a billion dollars of projects were awarded in two years under the Democratic Trisecta You know, we see this is very similar to how some of the other statewide departments are being run and our job is Is the oversight and I'm grateful that the auditor general goes in and does an independent review of Of these departments and these agencies, but this MPH I is at an arms length From the legislature so we are depending on the departments to be checking this stuff and we get wholesale information from the department

3:12But we can't dig into the details. That's why it's extremely important to have these inquiries these audits by the auditor general Okay, so now you've got the audit. What can you and the led legislator do at this point? Well, we're going to be taking a very deep dive adding for asking for accountability asking in subcommittees Calling MPH I and again and asking a specific contractual Agreements and asking them what are you doing? Where you at? You know, who's been doing the traveling? What is your significant finding finding out what the progress is is this just a flow through money? You know paying friends or is it they're they're doing legitimate business on behalf of the state and the Department of Health and Human Services And you know, I will say reflecting back You know, I understand there was a lot of money that came through the federal government for COVID It does not give you an excuse to be cheating the system or cheating the taxpayers. Are you prepared to withhold or a place on any kind of conditions on future funding until some maybe some stronger safeguards?

4:13They're in place Absolutely and we have already done that. I'm proud to say that I led the charge on more accountability and our work projects More requirements in the transparency. We have something in the budget called boilerplate. It's somewhat what you know what I refer to is the narrative and the spending plan and We did come to agreement in a negotiated budget with Governor and the Senate and that is there will be more reporting more accountability more timeliness on this So we can get this information at a much more important part and also it's the checks and balances at the beginning of the project and You know, I've been digging deep into this You know House Republicans have in many ways and we see a lot of deficiencies very similar to this and the way the state has been managed to last couple of years Representative anbowl and we appreciate your time as always. Thank you. Keep us up to date on this I will thank you very much. You have a great day. Yep. You got it. You do the same

5:14Um, I mean Accord to this audit the department paid about 108 million dollars before receiving or reviewing documentation validating that the work was done Just sign off You just can't do that. No. I mean, you just can't do that I don't care. I don't care who it's from where it's going. I don't matter. I mean look the reality is Is that a lot of money in the grand Michigan budget It's a it's a sliver. It's a sliver. But you know what it is, but it's still our money, right? Yeah, still tax payer money. Yeah, still your money Yeah, that's all I'm saying. That's all I'm saying. I mean, this is where you know You know when people are clamoring for transparency It's just one of the other examples. Yeah, yeah, no it may not be nefarious. It may not be Completely out of question like it might not be like a terrible thing But again people need to know what's happening with their money people need to know that it's being spent responsibly And it's being done on the up and up and it's it's being done in a glass window

6:18Nothing wrong with it. No, no nor should there ever be in no All right eight o'clock hour coming up here on jare morning. We'll get you caught up on the headlines coming up next on jare morning