New York City Comptroller William C. Thompson, Jr. issued an audit today finding the Department of Youth and Community Development (DYCD) has not maintained adequate oversight and monitoring of Beacon Program contractors to ensure they are providing services and activities to achieve program goals.

Beacons are school-based community centers where young people can go when school is not in session. They are operated by community-based organizations under contract with DYCD and are expected to provide a combination of services and activities consistent with their respective neighborhood needs and interests.

The audit –which covered Fiscal Years 2005 and 2006 – can be found at www.comptroller.nyc.gov .

The audit found general inconsistencies and deficiencies in both Fiscal Years. Some of the findings included missing monitoring forms, site visit inconsistencies, inadequate supervision of contract managers, and monthly report discrepancies.  Without ensuring that the Beacons are accurately reporting the results of their program, DYCD is not adequately managing its contractors.

“Contractor performance in and of itself is not an adequate measure of contract monitoring,” said Thompson. “The contract monitoring and oversight constitute an ongoing process intended to provide for the early identification and timely correction of program difficulties to ensure that the Beacons are working toward achieving their program goals and providing services and activities to the youth and community.”

For the 16 contracts in the sample DYCD contract managers should have completed at least 64 field visits in Fiscal Year 2005 and 96 field visits in Fiscal Year 2006. However, the Comptroller’s audit  found  that during Fiscal Year 2005, contract managers conducted only 42 (67%) of the required minimum of 64 field visits, In Fiscal Year 2006, 41 (43%) of the required minimum 96 field visits were conducted.

The audit issued 10 recommendations to the DYCD. Among them, it recommended that DYCD should:

• Ensure that contract managers conduct all required field visits to the Beacon centers each year.

• Ensure that all Beacon Unit contract managers comply with DYCD contract oversight and monitoring policies and procedures to document and record field visits and other monitoring activities.

• Intensify its efforts to develop performance-outcome measures that are feasible and do not rely exclusively on enrollment and attendance figures.

• Ensure that beacon contractor-performance evaluations are completed for all contractors at least once a year and submitted in a timely manner to the Mayor’s Office of Contract Services for entry in VENDEX. Performance evaluations for terminating or expiring contracts should be conducted reasonably in advance of the contract’s termination or expiration to ensure entry in VENDEX.

The audit findings were submitted and discussed with DYCD and on June 14, 2007 they generally agreed with the 10 recommendations.