Buffalo’s comptroller says some city departments are in violation of the city charter because they do not comply with internal audits.
Comptroller Barbara Miller-Williams penned a letter to the Buffalo Common Council stating that city departments “frequently fail to respond” to audit requirements “on a consistent basis.”
According to the letter, at the start of each audit the comptroller’s office sends a letter to the head of the department being audited requesting information to aid the audit process. At the end of the audit, a draft report is provided to the department accompanied by a “response template” for completion. But Miller-Williams states that despite this guidance there is a “recurring lack of responses.”
A written response to audit reports is mandated by section 7-7 of the city charter.
The lack of responses to audits is a “long standing historical issue” according to City Auditor Sam Bruno who spoke at the common council’s finance committee meeting, Tuesday.
“It hinders the audit process,” Bruno said.
Departments are mandated to respond within 30 days, but Bruno says that does not always happen.
"Even after the 30 days, we'll send a second, a third request. I mean, sometimes the audit files are laughable because it'll be like a year and we have no response," he said.
Bruno pointed out that when departments do not provide requested information, the city contravenes another section of the charter – section 7-6 which mandates that the city comptroller has “unrestricted access” to records required to carry out their duties - creating a snowball effect of non-compliance.
The city charter also requires departments to outline plans to solve any problems uncovered by the audit in their written response. So no response means there’s no record of a corrective action plan. That leads to questions of accountability and makes it hard to conduct follow up audits according to Bruno.
“We have no baseline for a follow up audit,” Bruno said. “If you have a response, you have a baseline of, okay, this was the plan that was stated, and we can track the progress on that plan. And then also transparency. The public should have a documented written response mandated by the charter.”
Fillmore District Councilmember and Finance Committee Chair Mitch Nowakowski called the lack of responses “disrespectful” and requested that the Department of Audit and Control provide the council with a list of departments that have not responded to auditors in the last year. WBFO has also requested these records.
University District Councilmember, Rasheed N.C Wyatt said that departments that fail to respond are “basically thumbing your nose up to the taxpayers.” He added that department representatives should be summoned to council chambers if they do not comply with the charter.
“When [city auditors] submit an audit and there is not a response, we should take the initiative to send a letter saying, ‘We expect you in these chambers with the response for the comptroller's office,'” Wyatt said.
Though Miller-Williams did not specify which departments were not complying, the finance committee agenda shows two internal audits completed in the last 12 months, both of which pertain to the Department of Public Works Parks & Streets and uncovered significant shortfalls when it comes to oversight of contracts and rent owed to the city.
The Department of Public Works did not respond to either of the audits according to the audit reports.
“'No information provided.' I don’t ever want to see that on another audit report,” Miller-Williams told WBFO. “[Departments] have gotta stop doing that.”
An internal audit of the contract for operations at the Erie Basin Marina published in October 2023 found that the city received rent of just $1 a year for nine years of the contract, rather than the additional 10% of net profits over $80,000 required between 2016 to 2017 and the 20% of net profits over $80,000 from 2018. It also uncovered questions of liability as the comptroller’s office could not confirm if the marina operator, The Smith Boys, had insurance in place.
A more recent audit carried out in May examined the contract for food services in City Hall and found that the operator, Sue’s NY Deli, had not paid rent to the city since March 2020 leading to $103,200 in unpaid rent owed.
Department of Public Works Parks & Streets Commissioner, Nate Marton, did not respond to WBFO's request for comment.
