Up and Coming Weekly is a weekly publication in Fayetteville, NC and Fort Bragg, NC area offering local news, views, arts, entertainment and community event and business information.
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8 UCW MAY 19-25, 2021 WWW.UPANDCOMINGWEEKLY.COM Auditor reports poor monitoring of COVID-19 relief money by JOHNNY KAMPIS e N.C. auditor said the vast majority of the $3.6 billion in COVID-19 relief funds the state received from the federal govern- ment was distributed with limited monitoring and controls. State Auditor Beth Wood's office released a report May 13 that said the Office of State Budget and Management's N.C. Pandemic Recovery Office needs to improve its procedures for distributing the relief funds. Examiners found that $3.1 billion of the money was dis- tributed without the office ensur- ing all recipients had a method to measure results. "As a result, there was an in- creased risk that recipients could have misused the funds without the misuse being detected and corrected timely," auditors wrote. "Additionally, NCPRO was lim- ited in its ability to know whether funds were achieving legislatively intended results and take timely corrective action if necessary." e state's General Assembly enacted the 2020 COVID-19 Recovery Act on May 4, 2020, which established the Corona- virus Relief Fund. e act tasked the OSBM with establishing the NCPRO to distribute the federal relief money. State agencies re- ceived $1.67 billion, education got $524 million, nonprofits received $341 million, local governments got $317 million, hospitals re- ceived $102 million; and $645 million went to offset state general fund expenditures. Auditors found that NCPRO didn't independently verify re- cipient spending by comparing supporting documents such as invoices and receipts to expen- ditures reported by recipients until November, after most of the money was already spent. Additionally, examiners tested all Recovery Act disbursements to 490 recipients through October and found that 9% did not report what they planned to do with the funds, 68% reported objectives but not goals for how they would accomplish those objectives; and 39% failed to measure their prog- ress toward meeting their goals. Wood's office said that NCPRO should perform independent veri- fication of recipients' self-report- ed spending to ensure the money is spent in accordance with the Recovery Act. NCPRO should also develop procedures for ensuring recipients develop objectives for the use of the money and ways to measure progress toward those objectives. NCPRO told auditors it didn't ensure all recipients had a meth- od to measure results because it chose to prioritize coordinating and distributing funds and provid- ing technical assistance to recipi- ents instead. Changing guidance from the Treasury Department on allowable use of the money also delayed developing policies, that office said. In its response to the audit report, State Budget Director Charles Perusse and NCPRO Executive Director Stephanie McGarrah wrote that, "we take the findings presented in this report very seriously, and we have already begun making changes to address them and to ensure that the North Carolina Pandemic Recovery Office will be well- equipped to handle the additional federal recovery dollars that the State will receive to recover from the pandemic." NEWS TOURNAMENT BUSINESS A WIN FOR CUMBERLAND COUNTY It is no surprise that the COVID-19 pandemic affected the group sales industry, and Cumberland County was not an exception. While meetings are now beginning to rebound, we saw an upswing in tour- nament bookings starting in late summer 2020. This is due in part to fewer restrictions on outdoor events, the sales team's focus on tournaments, and the addition of Amy Karpinski as our Sports Sales Manager in June of 2020. As the president of the Cape Fear Table Tennis Club, and an orga- nizer of international table tennis tournaments, Amy understands the needs of tournament planners and has a passion for events. "I love what I do," says Amy. "Helping tournament planners learn about the assets in my adopted hometown and then seeing their tournament succeed is beyond rewarding." A sample of the 17 tournaments Amy has booked during her tenure include: • Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) Super Regional Basketball Cham- pionship / April 14-18, 23-25 • 2021 Carolina Gloves Boxing Championship / May 14-16 • Armed Services Skeet Championship / May 17-21 • 2021 Christy Martin All American City Title Boxing / July 23-25 • 2021 Butterfly Cup (Table Tennis) / September 3-5 These bookings represent nearly 2000 room nights at area hotels and an estimated impact on the local enocomy of $225,000 Cumberland County offers 115 venues that can host a variety of events - soccer, basketball, skeet shooting, fishing, wrestling, table tennis boxing, baseball, softball and more. Amy can help you bring your tournament to Cumberland County. Call her at 483-5311 for more information. ABOUT THE AUTHOR Melody Foote Director of Communications Fayetteville Area Convention & Visitors Bureau B U L L E T I N Download a mobile app for exploring Cumberland County. State Auditor Beth Wood speaking at the John Locke Foundation. (File photo courtesy Carolina Journal) JOHNNY KAMPIS, Carolina Journal News Service. COMMENTS? editor@upand- comingweekly.com. 910-484-6200.