Stitt administration defends COVID-19 relief spending
Top state leaders on Thursday defended the Stitt administration's spending of $ 1.26 billion in federal coronavirus relief funds and said there's documentation to explain how every dollar was spent.
Officials from Gov. Kevin Stitt' s administration in charge of Oklahoma's portion of federal CARES Act funds appeared before state lawmakers as the director of a legislative watchdog office detailed a report that raised questions about how the relief dollars were spent.
John Budd, the state' s chief operating officer, said he's confident all the CARES Act spending met the specific requirements outlined by the federal government and the CARES Forward team he led has provided more documentation to the Legislative Office of Fiscal Transparency( LOFT) to justify the spending.
A LOFT report issued earlier this month criticized the Stitt administration's record-keeping of CARES Act spending and warned some projects may not meet strict federal standards for coronavirus relief spending.
“Are we ready for a federal audit? Absolutely,” Budd said.
Budd said his team always expected that after the Dec. 30 deadline imposed by the federal government, the CARES Forward team would spend time organizing all the spending documents for a likely audit.
He said he recently discussed CARES Act audits with State Auditor and Inspector Cindy By rd. Oklahoma Attorney General Mike Hunter in April asked By rd for an investigative audit of the State Department of Health, including spending of federal relief dollars.
Budd dismissed the idea that the federal government might claw back some of the funds, which could happen if funds were misspent.
The LOFT report criticized CARES Forward's record keeping, saying the group didn't provide any documentation for $103 million in projects. Another $122 million in CARES Act spending may not be “necessary” pandemic expenditures, based on what little documentation was provided, the report says.
Budd criticized that the LOFT audit started in September as t he CARES Forward team was still trying to spend the bulk of the funds.
“You' re basically auditing a process while it' s in motion,” he said.
On Thursday, LOFT Director Mike Jackson said the CARES Forward team has provided several boxes of additional do cum enta ti on, but some records are still lacking what must be produced for a federal audit.
The LOFT Oversight Committee, made up of a bi partisan and bicameral group of state lawmakers, directed LOFT to continue tracking CARES Act funds.
“The goal today is not just to rehash the past and what happened, but figure out how we can make the process better and work to make things better,” said Rep. Kyle Hilbert, R-Depew. “I think everyone in this room agrees with that, and we all know it's a very good possibility that more federal funds are coming.”
The meeting appeared cathartic for St itt administration leaders and state lawmakers. Top legislators have been at odds with the administration over the CARES Act funds since the spring because St itt, rather than the Oklahoma Legislature, was in charge of overseeing spending.
Both sides agreed legislators should play a more active role in appropriating future pandemic relief funds.
“We should try to figure out what's the best model to work together,” Budd said.
St itt formed a bi partisan legislative advisory committee to advise his administration on CARES Act spending. Legislative leaders have said they want the Legislature to have a greater say in how federal stimulus funds are spent and are advancing legislation to that end.
Meaningful input from legislators is a necessary accountability measure going forward, said Sen. Julia Kirt, D-Oklahoma City, who serves on the LOFT Oversight Committee.
“As Oklahomans struggled with staying healthy and safe, job losses and other real-life needs, we should have invested federal and state funds to address the emergencies to get citizens healthy and employed,” she said .“My biggest apprehension remains whether the governor chose to spend funds on non-emergency projects unrelated to pandemic response or economic relief.”
The LOFT report questioned whether the St itt administration spent too much CARES Act funds on state agency needs and digital modernization projects.
Budd and Steven Harpe, the executive director of the Office of Management and Enterprise Services, def ended the te ch nology upgrades by detailing how difficult it was to shift 33,000 state employees to remote work during the pandemic.
But lawmakers questioned $110 million in CARES Act funds spent on a backup data center in Texas. Budd said the backup data center was necessary to keep state agencies running in emergency situations, and the location was intentional so the facility wouldn't be hit by the same severe weather that might hit Oklahoma.
LOFT, a pet project of House Speaker Charles McCall and Senate Pro Tem Greg Treat, formed in 2019 to oversee state agency spending and performance.