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U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
Office of Inspector General
At a Glance
17-N-0295
June 28, 2017
Why We Did This Review
The U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency's (EPA's)
Office of Inspector General
(OIG) operates and maintains
a system of quality controls
designed to provide
reasonable assurance that
personnel performing audit or
evaluation functions comply
with all generally accepted
government auditing standards
(GAGAS) and established OIG
policies and procedures.
Quality assurance staff
from the OIG's Office of
Management, Office of Audit,
and Office of Program
Evaluation report annually on
systemic issues identified
during referencing and
compliance monitoring
reviews. They also make
observations on compliance
with GAGAS and OIG policy.
This report addresses the
following EPA OIG goal:
• Contribute to improved
business practices and
accountability.
Quality Control Review of EPA OIG Reports
Issued in Fiscal Year 2016
What We Found
During the fiscal year (FY) 2016 quality
assurance monitoring process, the OIG
continued to make internal
improvements related to the planning
and supervision of audits and
evaluations, quality of evidence
collected, and reporting of audit status
and accomplishments in OIG
information systems. Nonetheless,
further improvements can be made.
OIG reports issued in FY 2016
demonstrated high levels of
compliance with OIG quality
assurance procedures and
received average compliance
scores of 93 percent. Most of the
issues identified during the
FY 2015 review have improved.
The FY 2016 review noted a few
additional areas for improvement.
Product Line Directors and staff have improved their ensuring that working
papers are clear, concise and easy to follow. Staff also continued to resolve
Project Manager and Product Line Director comments in working papers in a
timely manner, and to ensure that the clearance of comments is documented in
working papers. Personal impairment forms were clearly legible to the reviewer
based on action taken in response to our recommendation in the prior quality
control review. In addition, a review of a sample of EPA OIG staff training
records showed that they met the required Continuing Professional Education
requirement for the 1-year period ending September 30, 2016.
We found that improvements should be made in the frequency and
documentation of agency status meetings. We noted that 12 of the 54
assignments scored, or 22 percent, lacked documentation of meetings or that
the agency was updated on the status of findings during the meeting. Also, the
agency was not regularly updated throughout the assignment; specifically,
agency status meetings were not consistently provided every 4 to 6 weeks.
Recommendations for Improvement
We recommend that the Deputy Inspector General require OIG managers to
reinforce Project Management Handbook and OIG policy requirements that
teams have regular status meetings at least every 4 to 6 weeks or as agreed to
with the reviewed entity. Projects should begin with a documented kickoff
meeting and continue with regular documented status meetings throughout the
project.
Deputy Inspector General Response
Send all inquiries to our public
affairs office at (202) 566-2391	The Deputy Inspector General agreed with this report's recommendation and
or visit www.epa.gov/oig.	suggestions, and directed the Office of Audit and Office of Program Evaluation
to provide specific milestone and/or completion dates. The Office of Audit and
Listing of OIG reports.	Office of Program Evaluation implemented the corrective actions to meet the
intent of the recommendation and suggestions.

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