MESSAGE FROM THE ACTING INSPECTOR GENERAL JILL MATTHEWS
Iam pleased to present our report for the period April 1, 2018, to September 30, 2018. In May 2018, the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) celebrated its 85th anniversary. Also in 2018, the Inspector General community commemorated the 40th anniversary of the Inspector General Act of 1978 which established Inspectors General at 12 agencies. There are now 73 Inspectors General in the federal government all with the mission to promote economy, efficiency, and effectiveness and prevent and detect fraud, waste, and abuse.
Our office was created 33 years ago by the TVA Board of Directors (Board) and later became statutory in the 1988 amendment to the Inspector General Act. For 33 years, our office has provided independent analyses of TVA operations and programs to help identify more efficient and effective ways to do business and to prevent and detect fraud, waste, and abuse. Simply put, we approach our work with the intention of making TVA better for the people of the Tennessee Valley.
In this semiannual period, our audit, evaluation, and investigative activities identified almost $64 million in funds TVA could put to better use, questioned costs, recoveries and savings, and shared opportunities for TVA to improve its programs and operations. Below are highlights of our work this period.
- Five preaward contract examinations of cost proposals submitted by companies to provide coal combustion residual program management services and two examinations of proposed labor and labor markup rates for current contract extensions identified about $57.4 million in potential savings opportunities for TVA.
- Four contract compliance audits identified potential overbillings of $5.2 million.
- A limited scope review of a concern received regarding TVA aircraft flights to Oxford, Mississippi, did not identify any flights for nonbusiness purposes.
- An audit of TVA's capital projects found that TVA is not adequately monitoring actual return on investment of capital projects.
- An evaluation of hearing loss claims identified improvements were needed in meeting requirements of the hearing conservation program, documentation provided to the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL), and verification of accuracy of the amounts billed by DOL.
- A follow-up evaluation of the work environment in the Nuclear Oversight group found some aspects of the work environment had improved or stayed the same while others had declined.
- Information Technology Audits identified areas for improvement related to TVA's privacy program, controls over key Sarbanes-Oxley financial spreadsheets, network architecture at a plant, and operating system server baselines.
- Organizational effectiveness evaluations in seven areas across TVA's Gas and Hydro Operations, nuclear site security groups, and TVA's Supply Chain organization identified strengths as well as risks that could impact the ability for the groups to achieve their missions.
- Investigative results included the sentencing of a former contractor employee, a former employee's indictment, nuclear system improvements, and terminations of employees who failed to report opioid prescriptions as required.
We look forward to continuing to work with the TVA Board and management toward our mutual purpose of making TVA better.