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U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
Office of Inspector General

At a Glance

16-P-0048
November 30, 2015

Why We Did This Audit

The U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency (EPA) Office
of Inspector General (OIG)
received a hotline complaint
alleging that the EPA's Office of
the Chief Financial Officer
(OCFO) intended to pay a
$250,000 bonus to a newly
hired employee because it was
unable to provide relocation
expenses for the employee.
The new hire was for the
position of Director, Research
Triangle Park (RTP) Finance
Center, in North Carolina. Our
objective was to determine the
validity of the allegation and
identify the basis for any bonus
payments made to the
employee.

This report addresses the
following EPA goal or
cross-agency strategy:

• Embracing EPA as a high-
performing organization.

Send all inquiries to our public
affairs office at (202) 566-2391
or visit www.epa.gov/oiq.

Listing of OIG reports.

Awards Made by EPA's Office of the Chief Financial
Officer Raise Questions

What We Found

The EPA's OCFO did not pay the alleged
intended $250,000 bonus to the newly hired
Director of the RTP Finance Center.
However, the Director did receive two
individual cash awards of $4,500 each
within 3 months of her start date. OCFO
justified the awards as follows:

OCFO's unprecedented award of
$9,000 in bonuses to a Director
less than 3 months after being
hired raises questions about the
reasonableness of the awards
and how the OCFO uses the
awards process.

•	The justification for the first award, within 6 weeks of the Director's start
date, stated that the Director "...took extraordinary initiative to assist the
Acting Chief Financial Officer in a final decision to transition the EPA to a
fully automated invoice processing system...."

•	The justification for the second award, 6 weeks after the first award, stated
that "Despite delays of the planned OCFO reorganization, [the Director] has
put into place initiatives to reorganize the RTP Finance Center to provide
more efficient operations."

The total award amount of $9,000 represented approximately 25 percent of the
Director's salary for the 3-month time period. Based on discussions with OCFO
management, this was an unprecedented amount by OCFO for such a short
period of time after a person being hired. OCFO had considered a third award,
but indicated that because of the OIG review the award was never processed.

Although the individual awards were compliant with federal regulations and EPA
award policies and procedures, the amounts, justifications and timing raise
questions about the reasonableness of the awards, as well as how OCFO used
the awards process.

Recommendations and Planned Agency Corrective Actions

We recommend that the Deputy Administrator revisit the awards to determine
whether they are reasonable and properly justified and, if needed, take
appropriate action. For future awards, we recommend that the agency establish
and require a proper level of management review for multiple awards that total in
excess of $5,000. The agency concurred with the recommendations. The agency
indicated management officials will be required to take mandatory training related
to recruitment incentives and monetary recognition for employee performance,
and the agency will review the actions of the appropriate management officials in
this matter and propose any corrective or disciplinary action if appropriate. The
agency did not provide completion dates for all the planned corrective actions.

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