NEW: PERFORMANCE AUDIT OF GRANTS FROM THE CITY OF OAKLAND TO SABA GROCERS INITIATIVE AND ITS FISCAL SPONSOR

On July 1, 2024 the Office of the City Auditor issued an audit report titled, Performance Audit of Grants from the City of Oakland to Saba Grocers Initiative and Its Fiscal Sponsor.

Saba Grocers Initiative (Saba) is a community organizing effort dedicated to creating equitable access to nutritious food for Oakland’s historically marginalized communities.

Between December 2021 and May 2023, the City Auditor’s Whistleblower Hotline received multiple anonymous complaints alleging that officials of a City of Oakland (City) contractor, Saba, did not distribute City-funded debit cards to community members, as the City contracted it to do. The investigation did not substantiate the allegations but found significant weaknesses with the City’s grant management and oversight of its agreements with Saba, necessitating a performance audit.

In October 2023, the Office of the City Auditor (Office) launched an audit to review payments from the City to Saba and its fiscal sponsor, InAdvance. The audit objectives were to assess 1) Saba’s compliance with grant terms, and 2) the City’s oversight of the grant funds.

The audit makes six recommendations to the City Administrator’s Office to address these findings. When implemented, the recommendations will create a structure to improve consistency, transparency, fairness, and public accountability around the City’s processes for managing and overseeing grants.

Our Office wants to recognize the multiple whistleblowers whose anonymous complaints about Saba’s debit cards led to the audit. Without them, we may not have become aware of the problems and risks with the debit cards or the many other issues we found during the audit. We’d like to remind all Oaklanders and City employees that we take your concerns seriously. Please submit a whistleblower complaint if you know of potential incidents of fraud, waste, abuse, or mismanagement affecting City resources or involving City officials, contractors, and employees.

Read the the Press Release.

NEW:  PERFORMANCE AUDIT OF THE DEVELOPMENT SERVICES FUND: CENTRALIZED FUND MANAGEMENT WILL BETTER CAPTURE CITYWIDE COSTS

On June 28, 2024, the Office of the City Auditor issued the Performance Audit of the Development Services Fund: Centralized Fund Management Will Better Capture Citywide Costs.

The Development Services Fund holds money that the City of Oakland (City) collects from development service fees that arise from the permitting of development projects throughout the city.

The objective of this audit was to review the management of the Development Services Fund, which had a year-end fund balance of $149 million in Fiscal Year (FY) 2019-20 and is projected to have a fund balance of $5 million in FY 2024-25, according to the 2023-25 Biennial Budget.

We made two recommendations to the City Administration: 1) to create a policy for periodic fee studies covering all departments that contribute to and draw from the Fund on an ongoing basis, and 2) to establish criteria for what types of staff may be funded with development service fees, as the number of staff funded with these fees has increased over time.

Read the the full audit here.