Governor Dennis Daugaard proposed and the Legislature created the State Board of Internal Control in 2016 to better monitor how state agencies use federal grants. After the SBIC’s first year of meetings, Bureau of Finance and Management Commissioner Liza Clark told the Legislature that “establishing and maintaining an effective system of internal controls will take years.”
Years means more than three. In its Fiscal Year 2019 Quarter 4 report, the SBIC says it has rolled out its Internal Control Framework to two state agencies, the Bureau of Finance and Management and the Department of Revenue. Two is better than none, but it is interesting to note that while the SBIC was Governor Daugaard’s response to the “ridiculous” corruption of the deadly GEAR UP/Mid-Central scandal that went unchecked for years by the Department of Education, the Department of Education somehow wasn’t first in the chute for application of the new Internal Control Framework.
Also interesting is the SBIC’s hesitation to be open and tough in protecting federal tax dollars:
Mark Quasney is state government’s internal control officer. Quasney told the board his concern was “broadcasting to others a roadmap” of how public agencies could be cheated.
“That’s why we try to avoid talking about specific controls as much as possible,” Quasney said. He said his office could privately tell agencies how other ones dealt with issues.
“The board is a stick, but we don’t want it to be a really big stick,” Quasney said, adding that he wants agencies to be honest in the information they give the board and see its role as “an honest tool to help them get better” [Bob Mercer, “South Dakota Panel Might Add Criminal Cases to Its Duties,” KELO-TV, 2019.05.30].
On openness, telling us how SBIC is stopping corruption isn’t a roadmap for corruption. It’s a warning to every potential cookie-jar-raider that they are more likely to get caught and publicly roasted than make off with hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash and prizes.
On toughness, why would a board dedicated to protecting our money want to swing anything other than a really big stick? If someone tries to take money out of my pocket, I don’t hold his hand to help him get better; I whack his fingers and call the cops. On behalf of all taxpayers, I say to the State Board of Internal Control that I welcome however big a stick they want to use to make sure scandals like GEAR UP and EB-5 never happen again.
Those scandals are happening now.
Ill bet ALEC has preprinted statutes that undo such legislation the “committe” is trying to “create a wheel” to protect the rest of us citizens. Gee maybe some liberal communities in blue states have already done the work.
“The corruption of the Republican Party in the Trump era seemed to set in with breathtaking speed. In fact, it took more than a half century to reach the point where faced with a choice between democracy and power, the party chose the latter. Its leaders don’t see a dilemma—democratic principles turn out to be disposable tools, sometimes useful, sometimes inconvenient. The higher cause is conservatism, but the highest is power.”
George Packer, in The Atlantic
is.gd/oV5gjP