Reports

Our audit objective was to answer the following questions: (1) What is Kansas’ process for distributing COVID relief funding?; and (2) Have Kansas’ distributions of COVID relief funding been appropriate? The scope of our work included examining the distribution process for CARES Act and American Rescue Plan Act funding. Additionally, we evaluated a sample of CARES Act expenditures made in 42 Kansas counties.

Our audit objective was to answer the question: what entities received Connectivity Emergency Response Grants and where were they located? We found that the Kansas Department of Commerce (Commerce) awarded $48.5 million in Connectivity Emergency Response Grant funds through 66 grants to all seven regions in Kansas with the largest amounts going to South Central, Southwest, and Northeast Kansas. We also found that Commerce denied some applications through its review process.

This audit focuses on information and recommendations we can provide to improve the Oregon Employment Department's (OED) unemployment insurance system ahead of future surges in unemployment, similar to the COVID-19 pandemic. We have found that OED has made progress addressing some of the most public concerns, such as the inability of its phone-based system to handle the spike in claims that occurred in March 2020. Additionally, Oregon fared comparatively well in terms of fraud within their unemployment insurance program.