Today, I see East Portland still afflicted by the concerns raised in an audit from thirty-five years ago. The very first audit I worked on reported the financial impacts of Portland’s annexation efforts. In the early 1980s the city initiated an effort to extend its boundary to add about 125,000 citizens. The multi-government initiative was… Continue reading Audit Story: Annexations
Observations
The Long View of Auditors
You’ve heard the old saw that those who ignore the past are condemned to repeat it. The same goes for audits. Ignore our recommendations and the waste, fraud, or risk exposure will continue. Auditors are historians. We study the past, gather evidence, make causal connections, and document our research, but unlike most historians, we also… Continue reading The Long View of Auditors
Balancing Transparency and Confidentiality
Audits of sensitive topics require different methods and interactions to be successful. Workpapers pose a particular challenge for auditors, as sometimes they will handle information that should either kept confidential or described in ways that respect the dignity of clients or victims. Auditors must maneuver through these situations while trying to abide by the public… Continue reading Balancing Transparency and Confidentiality
The Uncertainty of Economic Development Programs
Beyond compliance-testing, I concluded long ago that economic development audits have extremely high audit risks and only produce uncertain benefits. My corporate-speak bottom line is this: economic development spending is giving public dollars to a few business people with the hope that it will enrich the entire community. I look at economic development programs as… Continue reading The Uncertainty of Economic Development Programs
Audit Story: Raising Accountability of the PDC
The City of Portland appoints influential business and community leaders to its Portland Development Commission (PDC). This agency operates with tax-increment financing to subsidize projects for commerce or housing. Historically, most of its efforts invested in the downtown area to counter the flight of retail to suburban shopping centers. These “urban renewal areas” have remade… Continue reading Audit Story: Raising Accountability of the PDC
Auditing Social Justice and Equity
I applauded the addition of equity to the 2007 Standards because the public deserves fair treatment by its government, and auditors are in a unique position to find patterns of inequities. In our audit work, we come to understand the intent and objectives of the program, its procedures, the mechanics of service delivery, and the… Continue reading Auditing Social Justice and Equity
Audit Story: Understanding Overtime
This story begins before I was an auditor. I worked in the Planning and Research section of the sheriff’s office and during my time a charter change transferred jail responsibilities back to the sheriff where they had historically been. We were asked to prepare the budget of the jails and embarked on research to understand… Continue reading Audit Story: Understanding Overtime
IT Auditing: Be Prepared
Let me begin with the admission that I know very little of the Control Objectives for Information and Related Technologies (COBIT) or International Organization for Standardization (ISO) standards or any of the other criteria that are used to assess the integrity of information systems. I’m sure they’re good tools because they help auditors identify gaps… Continue reading IT Auditing: Be Prepared
The Bulletproof Audit
Public safety agencies are the most important to audit. These agencies consume the largest share of many jurisdictions’ resources, and small improvements can result in big savings and might even save lives. However, these agencies have responsibilities and characteristics that make them the most challenging to audit. To most people, public safety means police, fire,… Continue reading The Bulletproof Audit
Idealism and Cynicism
I have three questions to ask you about your audit attitude. Have you found that you can generally trust the information that people tell you in the organizations you audit? Do you respect the accomplishments and challenges of the organizations you audit? Do you believe that the organizations you audit can achieve a level of… Continue reading Idealism and Cynicism
