Legislative auditor surprised at reaction to recent Minnesota fraud reports

The Office of the Legislative Auditor is Minnesota’s non-partisan government watchdog. Last month, it put out two critical reports on how the departments of Education and Labor and Industry handled public funds. Specifically, the OLA raised concerns about Frontline Worker Pay and the Feeding our Future fraud involving federal dollars for children's meals.  

The office received pushback from both agencies in response to the reports. Legislative Auditor Judy Randall talked with MPR News host Tom Crann about that response. 

The following transcript has been lightly edited for clarity. Click on the audio player above to hear the interview.

You’re quoted in the Star Tribune as saying that there is a kind of “shoot the messenger” feeling of late that wasn’t always there. You also said you’ve seen increasing rejection of your findings and recommendations. Tell us about that.  

In terms of the “shoot the messenger” feeling, we do all of our work based on data, whether it’s quantitative data, whether it’s interviews, whether it’s surveys, it’s research. Everything we do is research-based, so we are reporting back what we’re finding.

We’re the ones presenting that message, and if people don’t like that message, they then seek to perhaps discredit or delay or talk about maybe how we didn't do something or how we did something we shouldn’t have.

That’s not to say that everything we say should just be taken blindly. We certainly have lots of conversations with agency staff and agency leadership to get to the truth. What we want to do is make public programs work better, and I think that’s what the agency folks want to do. 

A couple of recent reports had to do with funds during the COVID-19 pandemic. The argument from officials was they were just trying to keep afloat and keep everybody safe and solvent. Isn’t there some truth to that?

There has been an explanation from the administration. What I will say related to Feeding our Future is that we identified inadequate oversight that happened in 2018 and in 2019 — prior to the pandemic.

Now, sure, the pandemic, you know, turned everything upside-down for all of us, including the Department of Education. And I think we all owe them a little bit of grace for figuring out the best way to manage forward. But the point for Feeding our Future is: We saw problems prior to the pandemic and we saw problems then throughout.

Related to the Frontline Worker Pay, it’s almost the opposite. That program got put into place in 2022, so we were no longer in the heat of the pandemic. This was a time where things had settled down, people knew how to work remotely, and the Legislature had given the department a certain amount of time to get out the frontline worker payments.

The agency had six more months in that timeframe before the money expired, but it seems they felt a lot of urgency to get the funding out to folks. 

What concerns you most about all of this? 

The dismissiveness of these findings and reports is very concerning for me. And I want to be clear, there are a large number of state employees who are very concerned about protecting the taxpayer dollar, but not all of them. And that message isn’t always the thing that’s emphasized. 

At the end of the day, this has to be one of the top priorities — to make sure we are using taxpayer money the way it’s supposed to be used. Which will then help us get the programs and services that people want to get to the people who most deserve them. It's all part of the puzzle, and I think we need some balance.

MPR News reached out to the office of Gov. Tim Walz for a comment on the recent OLA report. The response follows:  

We appreciate the OLA’s work and often agree with them, which is why state agencies have implemented many of their suggestions. There are also times when the OLA’s suggestions don’t apply because the audits come out years after we’ve resolved an issue, they suggest actions that have already been taken, or they evaluate programs that no longer exist.

Sometimes, state agencies have expertise and knowledge that the OLA does not, and in those cases we may fundamentally disagree. Regardless, we always take their advice and recommendations seriously and ultimately do what we believe is in the best interest for Minnesotans. We are constantly evaluating ways to eliminate fraud and improve government programs, and we’re grateful for the OLA’s assistance.