The New York State and agency audits summarized below were posted on the Internet on May 30, 2025.
Click on the text highlighted in color to access the complete text of the audit.
Empire State Development – COVID-19 Pandemic Small Business Recovery Grant Program (2023-S-10)
Empire State Development (ESD) was charged with administering the COVID-19 Pandemic Small Business Recovery Grant Program (Program) designed to support small businesses or for-profit independent arts and cultural organizations impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic that either did not qualify for federal assistance programs or that received inadequate federal COVID-19 support. ESD awarded the entirety of the $760 million allocated for small businesses to 40,842 applicants, with an average grant amount of $18,608. Auditors found ESD awarded almost $4.1 million to 101 businesses that were ineligible because they had already received assistance from federal business assistance programs. Additionally, ESD did not consider business type, need, or factors established in the original goals of the Program when awarding grants, instead favoring a first-come, first-served methodology to awarding grants, which resulted in tens of thousands of businesses that went unfunded and certain types of businesses—most notably sole proprietor transportation businesses without employees (i.e., rideshare drivers)—receiving a significant percentage of the total dollars spent.
State Education Department (Preschool Special Education Audit Initiative) – Jackson Child Development Center, Inc.: Compliance With the Reimbursable Cost Manual (2022-S-21)
Jackson Child Development Center, Inc. (JCDC), a New York City-based not-for-profit organization, is approved by the State Education Department (SED) to provide preschool special education services to children with disabilities ages 3 to 5. For the three fiscal years ended June 30, 2020, JCDC reported approximately $24 million in reimbursable costs for its SED preschool cost-based programs. Auditors identified $3,020,800 in reported costs that did not comply with requirements.
Department of Health and Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Services – Oversight of Water Supply Emergency Plans (Follow-Up) (2024-F-32)
The State Public Health Law requires community water systems that supply drinking water to more than 3,300 people to prepare and submit a Water Supply Emergency Plan to the Department of Health (DOH) for approval at least once every five years. Plans must include an Emergency Response Plan, a Vulnerability Analysis Assessment, and a Cybersecurity Vulnerability Assessment. A prior audit, issued in June 2023, found several instances where it had been more than 10 years since the last Emergency Response Plan or Vulnerability Analysis submission, and some water systems had never submitted a Cybersecurity Vulnerability Assessment. Further, there was limited participation by Local Health Department staff in calls and site visits where the Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Services (DHSES) communicates recommendations to water systems. DOH and DHSES officials have made significant progress in addressing the problems identified in the initial audit report, implementing four recommendations and not implementing one.
Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance – Monitoring of Homeless Data (2023-S-38)
The Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance (OTDA) supervises homeless shelters and related programs through 58 local departments of social services (Local Districts). While reports from Local Districts provide aggregate data to OTDA, Local Districts typically also collect and submit client-level data on the populations they serve to Homeless Management Information Systems (HMISs). In New York, federally funded regional or local planning bodies—Continuums of Care (CoCs)—that coordinate housing and services funding control access to the HMISs but are not required to share this data with OTDA or provide open access to the Local Districts that submit this data. Auditors found OTDA does not have access to the client-level data collected in the various HMISs—data that could be analyzed and used to help identify the root causes of homelessness, gauge progress toward achieving permanent housing, and better determine what programs are used or needed by the homeless population. OTDA asserts that it has no oversight of the HMIS data controlled by the CoCs and, consequently, has acquired permission to access the data from only seven of 24 CoCs, which represent approximately 7% of the State’s homeless population based on the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s point-in-time count.
New York State Health Insurance Program – UnitedHealthcare Insurance Company of New York: Overpayments for Physician-Administered Drugs (Follow-Up) (2024-F-35)
The Empire Plan is the primary health insurance plan for the New York State Health Insurance Program (NYSHIP), providing over one million members with health insurance coverage. The Department of Civil Service, which administers NYSHIP, contracts with UnitedHealthcare Insurance Company of New York (United) to administer the Medical/Surgical Program of the Empire Plan and to process and pay claims submitted by health care providers. Medical/surgical benefits cover a range of services, including physician-administered drugs, which are drugs (other than vaccines) that are administered by a health care provider in a physician’s office or other outpatient clinical setting. A prior audit, issued in September 2023, identified over $5.5 million in actual and potential overpayments for physician-administered drugs. United officials made some progress in addressing the problems identified in the initial audit, recovering about $501,000 of the overpaid claims, and were taking steps to make more recoveries. Of the initial report’s eight audit recommendations, one was implemented, six were partially implemented, and one was not implemented.