Audit Report On The Department Of Sanitation’s Automatic Vehicle Location Application

This audit determined whether funds spent on the Department of Sanitation’s (DSNY’s) Automatic Vehicle Location (AVL) application were adequately supported and whether the application functioned as intended.  On January 9, 2006, the Department of Information Technology and Telecommunications (DoITT) entered into a five-year, $500 million contract with Northrop Grumman Information Technology, Inc. (Northrop Grumman) to design, construct, manage, and maintain a New York City Mobile Wireless Network (NYCWiN) for certain City agencies. Through various task and change orders, the contract was modified on April 20, 2007, to include DSNY’s initial deployment of an AVL application, which is a computer-based system that uses a Global Positioning System (GPS) to identify vehicle locations on an electronic map.

Northrop Grumman installed AVL devices (each containing a GPS receiver, wireless modem, and processor) along with associated peripherals, including antennas and sensors, in 60 of DSNY’s vehicles (collection trucks and supervisor passenger cars) primarily located in Queens East District 8 (QE8).  Over the course of the contract, Northrop Grumman also delivered 26 mobile data terminals (tablets) to be mounted on docking stations in supervisor passenger cars.  In addition to the 60 vehicles equipped with AVL devices, in December 2010, DoITT provided (from its own stock and free of charge) six AVL devices that were installed in salt spreaders in Queens West District 6. To assist in its AVL application, DSNY received project management and quality assurance services from Gartner, Inc. (Gartner) via a task order to an existing contract DSNY had with this vendor.  In total, $3,694,613 was spent in capital funds on the AVL application at DSNY—$3,203,770 was spent by DSNY and $490,843 by DoITT.

The scope of the audit was January 2006 through June 2011.

Audit Findings and Conclusions

DSNY did not maintain adequate documentation to support some of its AVL application expenditures.  DSNY made questionable payments totaling $851,926.  DSNY made a questionable payment of $499,534 to Gartner for project management and quality assurance services. The supporting documentation for this payment raises questions about the appropriateness of the amount paid.  In addition, the timesheets associated with many of Gartner’s invoices were not approved by officials from DSNY in a timely manner.  These issues illustrate the need for DSNY to strengthen its controls over payments to consultants.  Furthermore, another questionable payment of $352,392 was made to Northrop Grumman for operating manuals and training materials. 

Based on audit tests and a survey we conducted, the application, when functioning, provides field supervisors with a tool that allows them to do their job more easily and efficiently.  For example, the map screen feature helps the supervisors locate their crews’ vehicles, monitor their crews’ work, and coordinate refuse collection and snow removal efforts.  However, a number of issues limit the AVL application’s usability on a day-to-day basis.  These issues include some inaccurate vehicle-position information on the map screens and tablets  displaying the map screens sometimes not working properly or at all.  In addition, several AVL features are not being used by most of the QE8 field supervisors, including vehicle diagnostics and custom reports.  Finally, DSNY lacked an adequate inventory system for its AVL devices and tablets.

Audit Recommendations

Based on our findings, we make 14 recommendations, including that DSNY should:

• Review and take all necessary action concerning the questionable payment of $499,534 to Gartner for project management and quality assurance services and the questionable payment of $352,392 to Northrop Grumman for operating manuals and training materials. 

• Improve its controls over payments made to consultants to ensure, among other things, that timesheets for consultants’ work are approved in a timely manner.

• Address the identified technical problems with the AVL devices and tablets. 

• Develop written AVL inventory procedures.  In addition to the need to conduct annual inventory counts and to maintain a perpetual inventory system, the procedures should require that inventory records contain adequate asset identification information.

Agency Response

In their response, DSNY officials generally agreed in principle with 10 of the audit’s recommendations, disagreed with one, and did not address the remaining three recommendations.