tailieunhanh - AUDIT OF THE OFFICE OF COMMUNITY ORIENTED POLICING SERVICES HIRING RECOVERY PROGRAM GRANT ADMINISTERED BY THE LOWELL POLICE DEPARTMENT LOWELL, MASSACHUSETTS

The absence of a common definition of computer audit may, in part, be due to the relative newness of computer audit. The history of traditional auditing or inspection can be traced back many hundreds of years. In contrast, computer audit is a relatively recent development. It was not until the late 1970’s that the majority of major organisations in the UK established a computer audit capability for the first time. The use of IT in business is also a relatively recent development. The father of modern day computing is generally regarded as being Charles Babbage, who produced his Difference Calculator in 1833. It was not until the. | AUDIT OF THE OFFICE OF COMMUNITY ORIENTED POLICING SERVICES HIRING RECOVERY PROGRAM GRANT ADMINISTERED BY THE LOWELL POLICE DEPARTMENT LOWELL MASSACHUSETTS . Department of Justice Office of the Inspector General Audit Division Audit Report GR-70-12-008 September 2012 AUDIT OF THE OFFICE OF COMMUNITY ORIENTED POLICING SERVICES HIRING RECOVERY PROGRAM GRANT ADMINISTERED BY THE LOWELL POLICE DEPARTMENT LOWELL MASSACHUSETTS EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The Department of Justice Office of the Inspector General Audit Division has completed an audit of the Office of Community Oriented Policing Services COPS Hiring Recovery Program CHRP grant 2009-RK-WX-0400 awarded to the Lowell Police Department Lowell Lowell Massachusetts. This grant provided 2 084 736 in funding to Lowell to avoid the pending layoff of 12 sworn officers. The objective of our audit was to determine whether costs claimed under the grant were allowable supported and in accordance with applicable laws regulations guidelines and the terms and conditions of the grant. We also assessed Lowell s program performance in meeting grant objectives and overall accomplishments. We found inaccuracies in the information Lowell submitted to COPS in its grant application. To select CHRP grantees COPS developed a methodology that scored and ranked each applicant based on key data submitted by the applicant. While COPS performed some limited data validity checks COPS relied heavily on the accuracy of the data submitted by grant applicants. As a result we reviewed the application statistics Lowell submitted and found inaccuracies in the amounts for locally generated revenue for fiscal years FY 2007 and 2008 the general fund balance for FY 2009 and the local area unemployment statistics for FYs 2008 and 2009. We also assessed the effect of Lowell s inaccurate application data and determined that it did not appear to have affected the suitability of the award. However to ensure future awards are not affected by inaccurate data we .