Posted on 12/09/2017 2:08:17 AM PST by profit_guy
Department of Defense (DOD) officials announced Friday that the agency would undergo the first full-scale audit in its history.
Defense Department Comptroller David Norquist said at a press conference that the audit would begin this month.
"It is important that the Congress and the American people have confidence in DOD's management of every taxpayer dollar," Norquist said.
[David L. Norquist is an American financial management professional and government official. Norquist was nominated in March 2017 by President Trump to be Under Secretary of Defense (Comptroller) in the United States Department of Defense. He was confirmed unanimously by the U.S. Senate on May 25, 2017.]
(Excerpt) Read more at thehill.com ...
It’s shocking to believe that the Pentagon has never had a full scale audit. Ever.
Having worked around the military for over thirty years, I would question this audit ‘claim’.
You can go to all military Visa-card holders and ask each one how much they have on credit and how much they’ve spent in the current fiscal year, and they can give you the precise amount.
Same is true for computer/hardware orders. They do yearly inventories.
I think where the real issues lie is that when you create a deployment zone, having people come and go....there is a limited amount of control. This is where you could have funds disappear or go into some black hole.
If this were a true audit, you’d ask about current assets, property, use of property, etc. Like you’d ask how many flag-poles exist on some post or installation, then discover there are close 100 poles on an installation. Then you’d ask why is it necessary to have 100 flag poles on one single post?
The Pentagon. The uniformed services conduct audits regularly. Congressionally mandated.
The financial controls I dealt with in thirty plus years were nonsensical. Let’s suppose two years ago money was allocated to buy 10 xyz spares. But as time progresses the XYZ is discontinued and the function taken over by the ABK module. The ABK has run into design problems that will require some rework. No money is available. But there is all that money for the XYZ allocated to the program but won’t ever be spent. Under the rules if I reallocated the money to resolve the ABK issues I would potentially go to prison. There is no authority who can allow me to do the reallocation. Eventually, we end up scrapping the entire program because it would have to be rebid and Congress is now tired of all the issues.
(The above is a mix-mash of actual real world problems put together in an attempt to describe the issues in one paragraph.)
Audit crooked Hillary’s DOS’ books.
My brother told of having identified a way to efficiently analyze a problem affecting a particular antenna installation, which simply required an off-the-shelf model of the plane involved, and a flashlight bulb. His boss might have put in a requisition for the model, but he wanted the answer “yesterday” rather than next year - so he had to buy the model out of pocket.
Not a big deal when it’s only a few bucks - but if it had been $500? $1000? There’s a gray area where paperwork wastes money and can get people killed.
There is a crying need to do that.
From what I have heard and been exposed to your description is a very good summary of the situation.
I don’t see how it’s possible to have an independent audit of the military. No accounting firm would have resources. A self audit is worthless.
As the “official photographer” for a retirement ceremony one time, I went to get the film developed. I thought I would just take it to the Post Exchange and have it developed there (which was two blocks away). The XO said “oh no you have to get three bids” so I got a government van I drove into town which was about 20 miles north and then I went to another place that was about 30 or 40 miles away and another place (the only 3 that accepted SF-44’s locally). All in all it would have been cost effective just to take it up to the Post Exchange and have them develop it using imprest funds(petty cash) and would have saved the wear and tear on a government vehicle, gas, not to mention hours of time at E6 pay. It wasn’t cheap & all because the XO feared any “impropriety” reflected in a future audit. And using the post exchange (AFFES) & paying with budgeted dollars was a huge no-no.
Rules is rules even if they are just plain stoopid...
The massive theft of taxpayer dollars here would stop with about 1,000 criminals being sent to jail.
We’re talking trillions of dollars stolen.
Instead of auditing the Pentagon (which is still a good idea), why not audit congress and the senate seeking excessive waste in those two black holes in space?
I was always amazed at the asinine policy of spending every penny of the budget or get it cut the following year - all the while preaching Fraud-Waste-Abuse.....if you tired to be economical, you got punished which means there was always a mad end of year rush to spend any residual funds - usually the Base Commander would take over all the various "excesses" and find projects to spend them all on.....we could save billions w/o that policy....
The problem is that the DoD uses multiple systems that don't talk to each other, they can't prove beginning balances (because some things go back 50-100 years and they have no auditable documents) and they have people telling us how to prepare for an audit who have never prepared financial statements or undergone audits.
This being DoD, we have more people on the audit readiness team than we have actually preparing the financial statements. Our customers (DoD agencies) are spending millions of dollars on consultants, who are telling them to do things that make no difference, but are not fixing things that will make a difference.
Make no mistake, this is a true financial audit - which has nothing to do with why there are 100 flag poles, but rather has to do with can you show adequate documents for each flag pole purchased demonstrating that what you actually paid was what is on the financial statements.
This is not about money being stolen or misused - DoD has had controls to limit and catch those things for many years. This is about being able to demonstrate to an auditor that the numbers on the financial statement are "fairly stated in all respects material" the activity.
Some people living comfy on tax dollars might not like this.
Prototype for other departments? That is the question....
There was a case in DC...around 2010-2011...the Navy guys came into a unit and did an audit over computer purchases. There was one single guy running things, for five years. Total mess. He’d stolen probably half-a-million over the period and the unit never realized what he’d been doing.
There was a case in DC...around 2010-2011...the Navy guys came into a unit and did an audit over computer purchases. There was one single guy running things, for five years. Total mess. He’d stolen probably half-a-million over the period and the unit never realized what he’d been doing.
MAGA. More Winning!! Thank you President Trump!
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