GAO Review of LEA Controls over and Uses of Recovery Act Education Funds (Avery County Schools)

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Recovery Act) mandates GAO to review states' and localities' use of funds made available under the act. Since April 2009, GAO has published bimonthly reports on our findings related to federal, state, and local implementation of the Recovery Act. Currently, we are examining the efforts of selected states and local educational agencies (LEA) to ensure appropriate uses of Recovery Act funds. In North Carolina, we have been reviewing efforts undertaken by the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction (DPI) and selected LEAs to administer and oversee the use of Recovery Act funds under the State Fiscal Stabilization Fund (SFSF) education stabilization funds; Title I of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 (ESEA Title I), as amended; and Part B of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA); as amended. As part of this effort, we met with various DPI staff and, from February 1 through 3, 2010, we visited Avery County Schools (ACS) to review and test the adequacy of controls and procedures in place pertaining to Recovery Act funds for these three federal programs. During our visit, we interviewed finance and program officials regarding internal controls, procurement procedures, and use of Recovery Act education funds. We also reviewed a nonstatistical sample of 13 expenditures of Recovery Act funds for goods and services under these three programs. As of January 27, 2010, ACS spent about $755,000 in Recovery Act funds. We primarily focused our work on two expenditures in our sample that ACS officials reported as their largest Recovery Act nonsalary expenditures. These two expenditures totaled nearly $105,000. We conducted our work from February 1, 2010, to April 20, 2010, in accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards. The purpose of this report is to bring to the attention of DPI our findings related to ACS.