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City auditor general Ken Hughes tabled his annual report on the fraud and waste hotline on Thursday, shedding light on theft, lawbreaking and peculiar behaviour in the municipal public service.
Seven employees were fired and seven others resigned after the AG investigated tips from the snitch line in 2016. More employees had their knuckles rapped by management.
The AG’s office collected 287 tips from the hotline in 2016, with the most coming in the area of misuse of city property or time. There were 82 complaints that fell into that category.
An employee was canned when the city found out he or she was working elsewhere while calling in sick. The city recovered $1,229 in sick leave payments from the employee. Another fired employee was doctoring a time sheet, marking work down when no work was actually done.
In another case, an employee was busted stealing copper from a city facility. The AG investigation didn’t even get to finish the probe because the employee was fired because of another investigation.
Two employees were fired after the city learned they were filing bogus health claims, both totalling nearly $3,000. Two other employees quit after together submitting nearly $13,000 in false claims. Ottawa police were called in to investigate.
There was one big mystery in the AG investigations. Six laptops worth a combined $12,000 were stolen from a city office, never to be found. The city doesn’t know what happened.
Most investigations ended with discipline or a stern talking-to by management.
People filed tips on employees using city time for Internet surfing, employees using city vehicles to go to a restaurant for two hours, an employee using the city logo to make apparel and an employee constantly calling and texting for non-business purposes.
Tipsters filed some questionable “fraud and waste” complaints, too.
For example, someone left a tip saying an employee brought a pet to work.
However, as Hughes pointed out, “it was virtually daily.”
In another tip, some complained about a contractor installing a garbage bin in the wrong place.
Top five fraud and waste categories from 2016 tips:
Unauthorized use or misuse of city property, information or time: 82
Violation of laws, regulations, policies, procedures: 26
Unethical conduct or conflict of interest: 20
Suggestions for improvement: 19
Theft, embezzlement, fraud: 18
Source: Auditor general fraud and waste report, June 22, 2017
Missing cash becomes AG cold case
Auditors were stymied by shoddy surveillance cameras in an investigation into $3,400 that went missing from two client service centres.
There was $2,700 short on March 9, 2016 at Ben Franklin. There was another shortage of $600 at Ben Franklin on March 17, 2016. Then there was $100 short at the Orléans service centre on May 27, 2016.
Auditors had trouble reviewing security footage because it was grainy, wasn’t recording to a hard drive or was coming from a camera that was blocked.
Auditors weren’t able to determine what happened to the money.
Ottawa police were called about the March 17, 2016 incident.
LRT planning still looks good, AG says
The AG still believes the city’s planning for the Confederation Line LRT is spot on.
In a final report, auditors found no gaps in preparing for the transition from a bus system to a bus and rail system in 2018. They released a mid-term report last year and followed up on 17 areas.
Where auditors discovered a concern in 2016 about LRT vehicles being delivered on time, the city by March 2017 had made sure there was a plan to have each vehicle delivered on time or ahead of time.
Auditors didn’t investigate if the entire LRT system will be delivered on time.
Not mentioned in the audit report was OC Transpo forgetting to budget for LRT training beginning this summer.
jwilling@postmedia.com
twitter.com/JonathanWilling
查看原文...
Seven employees were fired and seven others resigned after the AG investigated tips from the snitch line in 2016. More employees had their knuckles rapped by management.
The AG’s office collected 287 tips from the hotline in 2016, with the most coming in the area of misuse of city property or time. There were 82 complaints that fell into that category.
An employee was canned when the city found out he or she was working elsewhere while calling in sick. The city recovered $1,229 in sick leave payments from the employee. Another fired employee was doctoring a time sheet, marking work down when no work was actually done.
In another case, an employee was busted stealing copper from a city facility. The AG investigation didn’t even get to finish the probe because the employee was fired because of another investigation.
Two employees were fired after the city learned they were filing bogus health claims, both totalling nearly $3,000. Two other employees quit after together submitting nearly $13,000 in false claims. Ottawa police were called in to investigate.
There was one big mystery in the AG investigations. Six laptops worth a combined $12,000 were stolen from a city office, never to be found. The city doesn’t know what happened.
Most investigations ended with discipline or a stern talking-to by management.
People filed tips on employees using city time for Internet surfing, employees using city vehicles to go to a restaurant for two hours, an employee using the city logo to make apparel and an employee constantly calling and texting for non-business purposes.
Tipsters filed some questionable “fraud and waste” complaints, too.
For example, someone left a tip saying an employee brought a pet to work.
However, as Hughes pointed out, “it was virtually daily.”
In another tip, some complained about a contractor installing a garbage bin in the wrong place.
Top five fraud and waste categories from 2016 tips:
Unauthorized use or misuse of city property, information or time: 82
Violation of laws, regulations, policies, procedures: 26
Unethical conduct or conflict of interest: 20
Suggestions for improvement: 19
Theft, embezzlement, fraud: 18
Source: Auditor general fraud and waste report, June 22, 2017
Missing cash becomes AG cold case
Auditors were stymied by shoddy surveillance cameras in an investigation into $3,400 that went missing from two client service centres.
There was $2,700 short on March 9, 2016 at Ben Franklin. There was another shortage of $600 at Ben Franklin on March 17, 2016. Then there was $100 short at the Orléans service centre on May 27, 2016.
Auditors had trouble reviewing security footage because it was grainy, wasn’t recording to a hard drive or was coming from a camera that was blocked.
Auditors weren’t able to determine what happened to the money.
Ottawa police were called about the March 17, 2016 incident.
LRT planning still looks good, AG says
The AG still believes the city’s planning for the Confederation Line LRT is spot on.
In a final report, auditors found no gaps in preparing for the transition from a bus system to a bus and rail system in 2018. They released a mid-term report last year and followed up on 17 areas.
Where auditors discovered a concern in 2016 about LRT vehicles being delivered on time, the city by March 2017 had made sure there was a plan to have each vehicle delivered on time or ahead of time.
Auditors didn’t investigate if the entire LRT system will be delivered on time.
Not mentioned in the audit report was OC Transpo forgetting to budget for LRT training beginning this summer.
jwilling@postmedia.com
twitter.com/JonathanWilling
查看原文...
