Audit Report on the Department of Homeless Services’ Vendor Performance Evaluations

The Department of Homeless Services (DHS) is responsible for preventing homelessness before it occurs, addressing street homelessness, providing temporary shelter and social services to homeless New Yorkers, and assisting them in transitioning from shelter and the street to permanent housing. DHS contracts with vendors to provide goods and social services on its behalf and to support its operations and in doing so is required to follow the Procurement Policy Board (PPB) Rules.

Section 4-01(b) of the PPB Rules states,

A performance evaluation shall be done no less than once annually except that for procurements of goods by competitive sealed bid other than sealed bids awarded based on best value and procurements below the small purchase limits, an evaluation report shall be prepared only in cases of deficient performance.

Further, the PPB Rules do not apply to certain procurements as specified in §1-02(d) and certain transactions specified in §1-02(f), “provided [in the latter case] the ACCO determines that the process to be followed is in the best interest of the City and states the basis therefor.” The transactions specified in §1‑02(f) include government-to-government contracts, the provision of work or services by State-regulated public utilities, State-or federally-regulated cable television and other public services, professional memberships, and subscriptions.

The Mayor’s Office of Contract Services (MOCS) facilitates and oversees citywide procurement activities. The Director of MOCS is the City Chief Procurement Officer (CCPO) and is responsible for coordinating and overseeing the procurement activity of Mayoral agency staff. Within each Mayoral agency, the Agency Chief Contracting Officer (ACCO) is responsible for organizing and supervising the procurement activity of subordinate agency staff in conjunction with the CCPO.

In 2017, MOCS launched the Procurement and Sourcing Solutions Portal (PASSPort), an online portal, to facilitate the City’s procurement process and allow agencies to document and monitor vendor performance evaluations (PEs) in one centralized system. The PASSPort Performance Evaluations for Agencies user manual states that, “PASSPort will create a draft PE for the contract 12 months after the contract start date.”

During Fiscal Year 2018, DHS was responsible for evaluating vendors’ performance for 450 contracts that were registered with the Comptroller’s Office, with a combined maximum value of $5.7 billion.

Audit Findings

DHS generally did not annually evaluate and document vendor performance in accordance with the PPB Rules. Based on our review of the above-mentioned 450 contracts, DHS did not complete PEs for 171 contracts (38.0 percent), and did not complete PEs timely for 221 contracts (49.1 percent). DHS completed PEs timely for only 58 contracts (12.9 percent).

DHS failed to evaluate vendors’ performance for contracts at all or timely because it did not ensure that PEs were in fact created on contract anniversary dates, improperly requested PE exemptions for contracts, did not adequately monitor staff to ensure they completed PEs, and did not establish policies and procedures for PEs.

Audit Recommendations

Based on our findings, we made the following five recommendations to DHS:

• DHS should ensure that PEs are completed and finalized within 90 days of the contract anniversary date;
• DHS should review PASSPort to ensure that it includes data for all DHS contracts except for procurements of goods by competitive sealed bid other than sealed bids awarded based on best value, and procurements below the small purchase limits;
• DHS should request exemptions only for contracts that meet the PPB Rules’ PE exemption criteria and contracts for which services or goods were not provided during the evaluation period;
• DHS should ensure that the ACCO and ACCO staff monitor PE completion and periodically remind staff to complete PEs; and
• DHS should develop written policies and procedures, communicate them to staff, and train staff on their responsibilities for completing PEs including, but not limited to completion timeframes, and monitoring and follow-up activities.

Agency Response

DHS provided a Corrective Action Plan, which DHS stated “identifies the actions already taken, as well as actions that will be taken to address the recommendations in the report. While the agency does not agree with all of the report’s recommendations, we agree that further monitoring and training of staff are needed.”