Follow-up Audit on How the Public Safety Agencies Monitor Employees Who Use City or Personally Owned Vehicles While Conducting City Business

This is a follow-up audit to determine whether the recommendations made in two audits issued in 1999 have been implemented by the City agencies covered by those audits, which examined how Public Safety agencies monitor employees who use City or personally owned vehicles while conducting City business. "Public Safety" agencies are categorized as such by the Mayor’s Office of Operations in the Mayor’s Management Reports. In this report, we discuss the recommendations of the prior audits in detail, as well as the current status of each recommendation.

In Fiscal Year 1999, our office conducted two audits (MJ99-064F, issued June 28, 1999, and MJ99-095A, issued June 30, 1999) that examined how the Public Safety agencies monitor their employees who use City or personally owned vehicles to conduct City business. The objective of the first audit, a follow-up audit, was to determine whether the Public Safety agencies had implemented the ten recommendations made in a previous, 1996, audit on the same subject. The agencies covered in the 1996 report were:

• The Fire Department (FIRE)
• The Police Department (NYPD)
• The Department of Probation (PROB)
• The Department of Juvenile Justice (DJJ)

The objective of the second 1999 audit was to determine how the Department of Transportation (DOT) and the Department of Correction (DOC) monitored department employees who conduct City business while driving City or personally owned vehicles. Although DOC is also a Public Safety agency, it was not covered by the 1996 audit because the agency did not respond to our auditors’ requests for driver information. (DOT is not a Public Safety agency and is therefore not covered under this current audit.)

The 1999 follow-up audit of the Public Safety agencies (Public Safety audit) found that since 1996, the agencies had improved their monitoring of employees who are authorized to drive City or personally owned vehicles on City business. In addition, the overall percentage of authorized drivers with poor driving records had decreased. Most of the agencies were taking positive actions to ensure that their drivers were taking driver’s safety courses. However, the 1999 audit of DOC’s monitoring of its employees (DOC audit) found weaknesses in the agency’s oversight. A Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) check revealed that 3,224 (30%) of 10,836 DOC employees did not have a valid license on record. DOC provided additional evidence indicating that problems were resolved for 1,945 of them, leaving 1,279 (12%) with no record of a valid license. For the remaining 9,557 DOC employees with a valid license, 2,567 (27%) had poor driving records and significant notations on DMV records covering the previous ten years. Finally, that audit found that DOC did not have a driver’s safety program, even though City policy required agencies to initiate programs promoting driver safety.

Of the eight recommendations we made in the previous two audits, the Public Safety agencies implemented seven, and one was no longer applicable. The eight recommendations and their status are as follows:

1. "Check (or continue to check) with DMV to verify that all City employees’ licenses are valid before granting them driving privileges."
2. "Revoke driving privileges from all employees without a valid driver’s license." (This recommendation applied to DOC only.)
3. "Issue a letter to employees with driving privileges, stating that the employees must inform their employer of license status changes and that they are subject to disciplinary action if they fail to do so." (This recommendation applied to DOC only.)
4. "Follow up more effectively on notifications from DMV informing them that their employees’ licenses have been revoked and/or suspended. Agencies should take the appropriate actions to either have employees correct their license status or suspend the employees’ driving privileges." (This recommendation applied to FIRE/EMS and NYPD.)
5. "Prohibit (or continue to prohibit) employees with unsatisfactory driving records from driving City vehicles or personally owned vehicles on City business, as specified in the criteria defined in the City regulations and the agencies’ own regulations."
6. "Register (or update) all employees who drive a City or personally owned vehicle while on City business in [License Event Notification Service (LENS)]. There is no cost to the agency for participating in LENS or for using the DMV Dial-In Inquiry System. This will ensure that the data supplied to DMV is accurate and current, and that it reflects the agency’s procedures for monitoring employees who drive City vehicles." (This recommendation applied to DOC, FIRE/EMS, and NYPD.
7. "Develop a driver’s safety program for all employees who drive while on City business." (This recommendation applied to DOC only.)
8. "Enroll all employees who drive while on City business in its drivers’ safety program at least once a year." (This recommendation applied to DOC only.)

This follow-up audit found that the Public Safety agencies improved their monitoring of employees who are authorized to drive City or personally owned vehicles to conduct City business. In addition, the overall percentage of authorized drivers with poor driving records has decreased or has continued to decrease since the previous audits. All of the agencies are taking positive actions to ensure that their drivers take driver’s safety courses. The chart below shows a comparison of the findings of this follow-up audit and the previous audits.

To continue the progress that the Public Safety agencies have made, they should continue to monitor the driving behavior of their employees. In this report, we recommend that the agencies should:

• Continue to check with DMV to verify that all City employees’ licenses are valid before granting them driving privileges.
• Continue to prohibit employees with unsatisfactory driving record from driving City vehicles or personally-owned vehicles on City business, as specified in the criteria defined in the City regulations and the agencies’ own regulations.
• Continue to register (update) all employees who drive a City vehicle or personally owned vehicle on City business in the New York State DMV License Event Notification Service program.