FEDS REBUKE MBTA OVER LAX INVENTORY PRACTICES
The T continues to have problems keeping track of its inventory, federal authorities say, as they demand the MBTA take stronger action to correct one of its longstanding problems.
The U.S. Department of Transportation issued a report this month on the T’s 2017 independent audit, which pointed out equipment management “as a material weakness.” That audit, released in March, also found “significant deficiencies” in the T’s practices regarding contracting out work and keeping records of federal grants, but the DOT’s report this month only took issue with inventorying practices.
The T in a statement addressed one of the issues raised — that the T hadn’t completed a full inventory for the most recent two-year period required.
“MBTA staff met recently with a federal transportation official to go over the audit findings, where the federal official approved the T’s plan to complete an inventory of all fixed assets by Nov. 19,” spokesman Joe Pesaturo said. “Going forward, the T will perform an inventory of 50 percent of its assets annually, fulfilling the requirement that it be done every two years.”
The report recommended the federal agency’s Office of the Secretary and the Federal Transit Administration take “prompt action” to make sure the T complies. A Department of Transportation spokeswoman couldn’t say yesterday what happens if the T doesn’t create plans up to the feds’ standards.
The T’s annual independent audit for 2017 found that the T has improved over last year, when the feds also cited this as an issue, by updating policies and procedures — but not enough.
“Based on our review, the policy and procedures appear to be outdated and not followed by the Authority personnel,” the auditors of KPMG wrote.
The auditors say they found three equipment purchases that weren’t included in the database intended to track the T’s possessions. KPMG also found nine disposals of equipment that were not properly recorded, according to the audit documents.
The auditors also said the T never completed the required inventory review for 2015 and 2016.
Charles D. Chieppo, a transportation expert at the Pioneer Institute, said the inventorying of equipment has been a problem for years.
“They’ve got to do a better job with that,” Chieppo said. “Over the past three years, the T has done a lot of things right, but I don’t think people realize just how bad it was and how long it’s going to take to fix.”
Braintree Mayor Joseph Sullivan, a current MassDOT board member, said this was something that was a focus of the panel he served on in 2015 that took stock of the T’s issues following that disastrous winter.
“The inventory management was not being done well,” Sullivan said. “There needs to be a greater focus on the purchasing part of it in order to help achieve cost savings.”