Budget and audit committee minutes

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• Publié par: Thiwyir
• Nombre de lectures: 32
• Langue: English

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Budget and Audit Committee Minutes

October 22, 2009

Rehabilitation Services Commission

400 E. Campus View Blvd., Columbus, OH 43235

Call to Order

At 9:05 a.m. Chair Daugherty called the Budget and Audit Committee meeting to

order.

Approval of Agenda

Commissioner Romer-Sensky moved to add Maintenance of Effort Waiver as a

topic to the October 22, 2009 Budget and Audit Committee agenda, seconded by

Commissioner Growick.

Motion carried.

Introductions

Commissioners:

Chair David Daugherty, Commissioner Romer-Sensky,

Commissioner Growick

Staff:

Administrator Michael Rench, CFO Chris Hansen, BSVI Director Mike

Hanes, CIO Roger McMahill, Fiscal Officer, Marc Protsman, Fiscal Specialist

Steve Tribbie, Office of Communications Director Eileen Corson, Fiscal Specialist

Amadou Diallo, BDD Director Kathy Johnson, HR Director Janine Ashanin,

Guests:

Connie Hill, OARF, Kevin Futryk, OACCD, Brenda Hanes, GWC, Robin

Hepler, COVA

Teleconference participants:

Mark Seifarth, DD

Public Comment

None

Approval of Minutes

Commissioner Growick moved to approve the August 24, 2009 Budget and Audit

Committee Minutes, seconded by Commissioner Romer-Sensky.

Motion carried.

Review/Amend Committee Charter (attachment A)

Chair Daugherty read the Purpose Statement and asked Commissioners if they

had any comments.

Commissioners agreed with the Purpose Statement and

offered no comments.

Chair Daugherty read the changes made to the Key Work Products/Time Lines.

Commissioners agreed with changes presented.

Budget and Audit Committee

October 22, 2009

Page 2

Chair Daugherty read the Committee Function or Scope of Work and asked

Commissioners for comments.

Commissioners offered no comments and agreed

with statements.

Chair Daugherty read the Operating Principles and asked for comments from

Commissioners.

Commissioners offered no comments and agreed with

statements.

Chair Daugherty read the changes to the Composition/Membership section.

It

was suggested to change the composition of the committee from three members

to two members and the Commission Chair would sit as ex-officio.

Commissioner Romer-Sensky asked, can the ex-officio break a tie vote?

Chair

Growick stated we should do away with ex-officio and have the Commission

Chair participate in all three committees.

When Commissioners are ready to

review the Bylaws to establish the new Legislative Committee, which it is

currently an ad hoc committee, then committees can be composed of three

members.

We can keep the Chair as a regular Committee member and not have

the title of ex-officio member.

The Commission chairperson would then be a

voting member of each of the committees.

Motion

Commissioner Romer-Sensky moved to make a recommendation to take

to the full Commission to revise the Composition/Membership Committee Charter

to read, the Budget and Audit Committee will be composed of three Commission

members that includes the Commission Chairperson, seconded by

Commissioner Growick.

Motion carried.

Commissioners agreed with the changes to the Liaison Contact Information and

Backup Liaison Contact Information as noted in the Committee Membership

section of the Charter.

Review of Calendar for 2010

A listing of key fiscal dates for calendar year 2010 was provided for Committee

review.

Chair Daugherty identified February 24, 2010, April 21, 2010 and June

30, 2010 as potential dates for the Budget and Audit Committee Meetings.

Meeting times would be 9:00 a.m. – 11:00 a.m.

Committee dates for the second

half of calendar year 2010 will be established once Commission meeting dates

have been set for the balance of 2010.

Budget and Audit Committee

October 22, 2009

Page 3

Motion

Commissioner Romer-Sensky moved to approve the February 24, 2010,

April 21, 2010 and June 30, 2010 Budget and Audit Committee Meeting dates,

seconded by Commissioner Growick.

Motion carried.

Stimulus Update

VR Case Management

Administrator Rench thanked Communications Director Corson, CFO Hansen

and Fiscal Officer Protsman for their hard work in providing an extensive amount

of information to Controlling Board members.

He stated that the Controlling

Board did approve our request for a waiver of competitive bid for the VR Case

Management System.

IT and Contract Services are now reviewing the final

contract.

The Controlling Board request indicates that 8% of the contract work

would be subcontracted.

Mr. Rench stated, we want as much of that 8% as

possible to be subcontracted to an Ohio-based MBE or EDGE vendor.

Administrator Rench reported that the Controlling Board request did meet with

some outside opposition.

We are entering into the first phase of the contract,

which totals $3.5 million dollars for the two years.

Since ARRA dollars expire

September 30, 2011, we are under a very tight timeframe to complete this

project.

In addition Administrator Rench stated Susan Pugh, BVR Director, has begun

discussion with staff regarding the culture change the new web based system will

bring to about 400-500 VR staff.

Their business lives will change on how they

perform processes.

We plan to utilize some of BDD Director Johnson’s staff,

who have undergone a similar systems overhaul, to think about what we need to

prepare for with the upcoming system changes.

Commissioner Growick asked, can we get a flavor of the members of Controlling

Board, who expressed concern?

Administrator Rench responded the overall

concerns related to why previous bidding processes were not successful and

why OIT ultimately released RSC to negotiate directly with the software vendors.

CFO Hansen stated it also seems, due to budgetary constraints, the theme of the

Controlling Board focuses on cost savings and assuring that funding requests do

not by-pass the biennial budget process.

Administrator Rench stated there were several “friendly” questions from the

Senators.

We explained the benefits, cost savings for staff and an effective use

of our partners’ time to the Controlling Board members.

Budget and Audit Committee

October 22, 2009

Page 4

Administrator Rench stated OARF was very helpful and Executive Director Keil

lobbied for RSC, was there with us, and worked with Representative Hottinger

and attempted to talk with others.

We enlisted the assistance of the Governor’s

Office, who also contacted the Controlling Board members.

This is a very

important project facing this organization.

Administrator Rench further stated we respectfully disagreed with some points,

understood their concerns, provided lots of data, and explained that RSC has

ARRA dollars which will not be available in the future.

Based on the timing of the

stimulus dollars, this is our only real option. Commissioner Daugherty asked, did

any of the members ask about creating jobs?

Administrator Rench responded,

Representative Luckie was interested in his constituents.

Communications

Director Corson stated we included a breakdown county-by-county of RSC

consumers, hourly wages, etc., so the Controlling Board members would see

how the new computer system is a benefit to their respective districts.

The Ohio

Association of Goodwills also helped RSC.

Commissioner Growick stated congratulations and a tremendous thank you to

Administrator Rench and staff.

We will be tremendously different because we

have ARRA money and can go forward with the web-based system.

This is a

tremendous accomplishment and a coming-of-age event for our new

administration.

VR/ILOB/IL Projects

BVR Director Pugh reported there was a tremendous interest in the ARRA funds

with 65 proposals submitted.

The 65 proposals were evaluated and 19 contracts

were awarded.

Due to logistical issues with the 19 contracts, there are 25

separate contracts.

We awarded $7.3 million, which is an increase and more

than we initially planned to award in the first round.

The contracts started on

September 1, 2009 and will conclude on September 30, 2010.

The projects

awarded include a variety of services.

Many contracts are comprehensive

packages designed to provide a variety of services.

Due to the economy and

nature of individuals with significant disabilities, the 19 contracts were seen as

very helpful to consumers.

Ms. Pugh further reported on the contract awardees

as follows:

one contract was awarded to Enterprise Works; CRPs with specialty

groups have been awarded contracts; five contracts will serve people with mental

health issues; two contracts will serve transition students; two contracts will serve

ex-offenders; one contract will serve all veterans; one contract will serve

individuals with brain injury; and one contract is for the Business Enterprise

Budget and Audit Committee

October 22, 2009

Page 5

Program.

The Cleveland Sight Center’s project is to make their BE training

program an on-line program so that it is more accessible to people with visual

impairment.

We are also pleased that several contracts include collaboration

amongst multiple CRPs.

She further stated, of the entities not selected, we

offered to meet with them and provide feedback about their proposals.

BVR

Director Pugh met with 20 of those not awarded and had very productive

discussions so they can prepare for the next round of stimulus dollars.

In addition, BVR Director Pugh reported we have available the second half of

stimulus money for RFPs.

The bureaus have spent time gathering input from

staff regarding their community needs, bringing together people from the field to

evaluate feedback and look at developing RFPs for these projects.

She stated,

we want to be more descriptive in this round of RFPs.

The expectation is by the

end of November, we will have the second round of RFPs out.

Applicants said

they would like to have more time – a couple of extra weeks to write and submit

their proposals.

Administrator Rench stated, we are holding out funds from the second round of

stimulus money to hire two positions.

Per RSA, the TBI grant requires a full-time

grant person.

RSC did not budget for this position.

We are buying some time

with ARRA funds.

The second position is for a project management position.

In addition, Administrator Rench stated the $10.6 million is the amount for the

second round of funding.

He asked, do we need any of this money for VRCMap?

CFO Hansen responded, monies for the first round and second round of funding

are being set aside for VRCmap.

However, she needs to sit down and see what

dollars have been allocated through the RFPs, VRCMap and staff, and see what

the remaining dollars are.

Commissioner Romer-Sensky asked, what is geographical distribution?

BVR

Director Pugh responded, we have a couple of statewide projects.

We awarded

more projects in the northern region than in the southern region.

We need to

take a look at geographical distribution in the second round of stimulus funds.

Commissioner Growick stated, has there been discussion among the 60 or so

applications for the need for accreditation.

Was this a prerequisite for applying

and are there any thoughts or maybe the time frame is too short to address this?

He further stated there may be an accredited entity that we would want to fund,

especially innovative and creative projects, and our partners cannot get

accredited due to funds.

BVR Director Pugh responded, the project proposals

needed to address how our accreditation rule would be met if they plan to

Budget and Audit Committee

October 22, 2009

Page 6

provide a service that requires accreditation.

We also said that for proposals that

provided services requiring accreditation, the applicant must be the accredited

entity.

For example, we did have to reject a rehabilitation technology project due

to elements in the proposal that were not appropriately accredited.

In these

situations, we talked with entities that submitted proposals and discussed options

and for them to resubmit proposals, in the second round, and not include

services that require accreditation or collaborate with CARF-accredited entities to

develop a work plan to put together an application.

We are open to entities that

are not accredited so long as the proposal does not include services that require

accreditation.

Administrator Rench stated this is a long term issue we are exploring and will be

bringing to the Committee.

Other states reimburse CRPs for CARF

accreditation.

If we were to consider this, we would not want to fund one group

but not other entities.

He further stated we are looking at a mechanism to allow

all participants to reduce their costs.

We are researching what other states are

doing.

Commissioner Romer-Sensky stated RSC might want to look at ODJFS who

provides incentives for childcare to get accredited.

Mental Health moved more of

its providers to accreditation and they had some incentives.

She stated RSC

may want to have conversations with its sister agencies about this.

Chair Daugherty asked, how many of the projects will sustain after ARRA funding

goes away?

BVR Director Pugh responded, in the selection criteria, we identified

an element that scored the project’s sustainability.

This was not an area that

people who submitted proposals scored well in.

There are not opportunities for

alternate funding given the current state of our economy.

We identified this as an

element of scoring because we would want to give additional consideration to the

project if sustainable funding were available.

Regarding the accreditation, we

have been referring them to training that OARF is providing through its earmark.

This is a very helpful resource to RSC.

Chair Daugherty stated there is a period of time, in the rules, that an organization

can become accredited through CARF.

There is an opportunity to work the clock

to get an accreditation.

RSC rules require the accreditation to provide core

services.

There are some preliminary accreditation options available through

CARF that RSC would accept.

There is technically a waiver opportunity if we do

not have a service provider in the area.

Budget and Audit Committee

October 22, 2009

Page 7

Commissioner Growick stated we need to invite OARF to the November 18, 2009

Commission Meeting regarding its earmark.

Chair Daugherty agreed to add

OARF Earmark as an agenda item.

Commissioner Romer-Sensky asked staff to

provide a one to two page document describing what it means to be accredited

and what the costs are and how many agencies are accredited.

Commissioner Growick asked, regarding the 19 projects awarded, how will this

decrease RSC’s waiting lists?

BVR Director Pugh responded, we do not have a

waiting list today.

However, we do not expect to maintain that success.

We are

expecting ERI reduction in staff over the next couple of months.

She stated that

one influencing factor related to this is quality.

We have been talking with staff

about spending more time with consumers and ensuring that we are not

admitting more consumers than we can serve appropriately.

After the first of the

year, we are anticipating that we will have waiting lists.

However, we are starting

processes that we believe will have minimum impact on consumers.

The intake

and orientation projects can certainly help us with this.

We can move these two

items off the counselor’s plate.

Four projects are providing this service for us.

We will continue to provide updates to Commissioners.

Commissioner Growick asked, are we having a pre-bidders conference for this

next round of RFPs?

He further asked, are we helping bidders with the process?

BVR Director Pugh responded, we plan to look at where applicants were

struggling and make improvements to the RFP in these areas.

We are also

planning a pre-proposal conference – and will share some of this information

about what we learned to help applicants with their proposal.

We do plan to

make changes to RFP to help applicants better understand what we are looking

for.

BDD

Chair Daugherty asked BDD Director Johnson to report on BDD’s hiring

activities.

BDD Director Johnson reported we had 400 applicants for the next

adjudicator hiring.

Those applicants who were qualified moved to the next

process.

We interviewed 173 people.

Due to space constraints, we asked SSA

to approve 12 and start a new class in January 2010.

We anticipate another

class in March so we do not have to go through the interviewing process again.

BDD Director Johnson stated our new training room moved to the “old” Scioto

Room.

The “old” BDD Training Room is being set up to train new Pathways

people.

BDD Director Johnson further reported the new adjudicators will be moved to

where HR was previously housed.

BDD Supervisor positions have been posted

and interviews are being held.

She stated SSA continues to expect the workload

Budget and Audit Committee

October 22, 2009

Page 8

to increase and is looking at ways to accommodate this.

On a national basis,

SSA is looking to move work around the states.

Regarding Medicaid, BDD Director Johnson reported the group continues to

have dialogue. The meeting in September was cancelled.

A meeting was held in

October and discussed the counties’ concerns about JFS no longer providing the

hearings process and how the hearing process will work.

There seems to be

confusion and conflicts with claimants.

CMS is to check their rules on this.

A

second meeting has been scheduled for this Friday.

Administrator Rench stated the federal government sent RSC a letter stating this

is going to take a lot longer than what we think.

BDD Director Johnson stated we

submitted the proposal to SSA and to Baltimore.

We have not heard back from

them.

IL/OB/IL

BSVI Director Hanes reported ILOB had a stimulus award during the same time

as the VR program.

We provided an annual grant award to the Centers.

We did

not award all funds from the first stimulus RFP.

We issued $704,000 in awards.

The stimulus funds required a 10% match.

Discussions are being held in

counties and locating partners.

We have served about 2400 and this is a boost

to serve individuals throughout the state.

Commissioner Romer-Sensky stated, we asked the local community to come up

with the 10% match.

She further stated, is this a burden for them, especially in

southern Ohio.

BSVI Director Hanes responded, this continues to be a major

hurdle.

We are having discussions with the Department of Aging to help remedy

this in the local community and with veteran’s programs to cover the match.

BSVI Director Hanes further reported on the IL projects.

He stated, funds are

being targeted to create a new Part C program in Warren, Ohio and raising the

ten remaining Centers’ allotment to $350,000 to help stabilize, increase and

expand their programs.

We have approval from RSA and are proceeding with

this plan.

Administrator Rench stated there is a problem with RSA and Part C ARRA

dollars.

The Part C dollars distribution has traditionally been based on a formula;

however, RSC distributed the Part C stimulus dollars equally. RSA is now stating

the amounts that were allotted will serve as the basis for future funding for IL Part

C.

We are working with RSA on this issue.

This will affect IL’s spending.

One

Center could lose as much as $100,000.

ARRA funds have never impacted any

other formula.

There is no written documentation on this.

If we can’t get this

resolved, it could have a significant impact.

Budget and Audit Committee

October 22, 2009

Page 9

First 1512 Quarterly Report

CFO Hansen reported that “Section 1512” refers to the section of the federal

code that requires federal reporting under stimulus funding.

The State of Ohio is

reporting all ARRA information through the Governor’s SharePoint site, not

individually.

RSC participated in two reporting test runs.

The first actual

reporting was on October 10, 2009.

We provided ARRA information through

September 30, 2009.

There are 48 programs identified on Governor’s

SharePoint site.

RSC has three programs to report:

VR, ILOB, and IL Part B.

Of those 48 programs, we were in the first eleven to get our reports submitted

both timely and accurately.

The information in the report includes overall

program data including program description, total funding and contacts as well as

expenditure data and jobs information—both number of jobs created and a

description of the type of jobs created.

Programs had to provide information by

October 10

th

, then we had 10 days to report any revisions, then the federal

government has 10 days to review.

On October 30, 2009, the information

becomes available to the public.

CFO Hansen further reported, we had no

expenditures to report for this first reporting period because the reporting dates

ran through September 30, 2009.

We did have job information, but OBM said

since we had no expenditures and had job creations, this looks odd.

The First

1512 Quarterly Report will not show job creation information; however, future

reports will capture this data.

The first report should be available to view the first

of November.

SFY 2008 Audit Update

CFO Hansen referred to the Audit report in the packets.

She stated this audit

took much longer than past audits due to a number of factors.

There was a new

team of auditors, who were perhaps not as seasoned as past audit teams.

It

took them extra time to learn, understand, and go through our procedures.

This

audit team also applied new auditing standards, which had not been followed in

the past.

Finally, the implementation of OAKS, the Statewide automated

accounting system, had an impact on slowing the audit process due to difficulties

in obtaining necessary reports.

CFO Hansen stated there were two deficiencies in the audit report.

One

deficiency dealt with cash management procedures.

We could not sufficiently

prove to the AOS that federal funds were expended within three days of receipt.

We need to better document our cash management processes to support

compliance.

In response to a query from Chair Daugherty regarding OAKS, CFO

Hansen stated OAKS has refined their data so that it is more user-friendly and

provides the back-up documentation that we now need.

CFO Hansen reported

the second deficiency in the Audit report dealt with BDD and documentation of

internal controls.

This same finding was also noted in the Performance audit and

Budget and Audit Committee

October 22, 2009

Page 10

addressed by BDD at that time.

This finding is based on the adjudicator review

of payments for Medical Evidence of Records.

The system previously had an

automatic payment of 20 days without documentation of adjudicator review.

The

I. Levy system has been modified to address the deficiency as noted.

In addition, CFO Hansen stated there are six management letter comments.

She

will provide copies of the six management comments to all Commissioners.

Management letter comments are less significant in nature, but still warrant

attention; they do not come to the level of a finding.

Finally, CFO Hansen

reported the 2009 audit is underway.

Commissioner Growick commended the

Fiscal staff.

He classifies the deficiencies as minor.

September Monthly Budget Report – FFY 2009

CFO Hansen reported on the FFY 2009 September Monthly Budget Report via a

PowerPoint presentation (see attachment B).

Commissioner Romer-Sensky stated, regarding slide one, when was the last

time RSC turned back federal money?

Fiscal Officer Protsman replied, it has

been longer than 10 years.

Commissioner Growick stated, regarding slide 5 the donations language bothers

him.

He asked, can we change the donations language to BMV designation?

Chair Daugherty stated, does the holding account represent a savings.

He

asked CFO Hansen what worries her about the budget.

CFO Hansen

responded, she is worried about another state budget cut.

Additionally, FFY 10

has a big hole to fill in order to reach MOE.

Maintenance of Effort Waiver

Administrator Rench stated he asked CFO Hansen and her staff to prepare a

request for an MOE waiver for FFY 10, anticipating that we won’t make match

and do not want to carry a penalty forward.

CFO Hansen stated if we stayed

where we are now with current match sources, our MOE penalty is approximately

$7 million.

We will need a lot of match dollars to try to make that up.

Administrator Rench stated we would ask the Budget and Audit Committee to

give us permission to prepare a MOE waiver request, then take the Committee’s

recommendation to the full Commission to give us authority to utilize this waiver

request during FFY 10, if warranted.

Budget and Audit Committee

October 22, 2009

Page 11

Motion

Commissioner Romer-Sensky moved that the RSC Fiscal Office prepare a

Maintenance of Effort Waiver for potential submission to the Rehabilitation

Services Administration, seconded by Commissioner Growick.

Motion carried.

CFO Hansen stated we are starting the process early, if we take action and don’t

need it for a particular amount it can be adjusted, but having dialogue with RSA

earlier in the process really helps.

Commissioner Growick asked, has staff contacted Washington with the new

Administrator coming on regarding the MOE waivers that have been granted at

the federal level?

CFO Hansen replied, we had an initial discussion with RSA in

July but the MOE waiver topic was not discussed at that time.

CSAVR has

completed a survey on states that have requested a waiver.

She will check on

the results and get back with the Commissioners.

In the past, waivers were not

granted very often by RSA.

Chair Daugherty stated a meeting with Senators Brown and Voinovich may need

to take place.

Administrator Rench stated he alerted the Governor’s Office about

how important this is and that we will begin the process.

We will run a fiscal

model and report back to the Commissioners.

In closing, CFO Hansen reminded Commissioners that Fiscal will be coming

back to the Committee to modify the FFY 10 budget, specifically for dollars that

were not spent under programs during FFY 09 that must now be rolled into FFY

10.

Next Meeting Date, Time, Location

The next Budget and Audit Committee meeting will be held on December 16,

2009 from 9:00 a.m. – 11:00 a.m. at RSC, 400 E. Campus View Blvd.,

Columbus, OH, in the Columbus/Zanesville Conference Rooms.

Adjourn

At 11:00 a.m. Commissioner Growick moved to adjourn the meeting, seconded

by Commissioner Romer-Sensky.

Motion carried.