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MPR News Staff

Legislative audit criticizes Minnesota agency over COVID homelessness grant oversight

DHS commissioner testifies before lawmakers.
State Human Services Commissioner Jodi Harpstead testifies before lawmakers in 2019 in St. Paul.
Glen Stubbe | Star Tribune via AP

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An audit of the state office that provides housing support for people who are homeless found that it did not properly make sure grant money was legally distributed and tracked.

The performance audit by the Office of the Legislative Auditor found several issues with the Department of Human Services’ internal controls over grants for homelessness and housing support, and its compliance with certain legal requirements between July 2019 and December of 2021.

The legislative auditor found that DHS did not retain conflict of interest disclosures for COVID-19 emergency services grants. And the agency did not assess the financial stability of non governmental entities before making grant awards, which is state policy.

Several findings in the report cover the grant process and say the Department of Human Services did not follow up with how the COVID grants were spent, and kept paying groups working to alleviate homelessness even though the groups had missed deadlines to report how they were spending the money.

Another finding said DHS “did not timely and accurately reconcile advance payments and may not have collected all unexpended funds.”

In a written response, DHS Commissioner Jodi Harpstead said they will use the audit to continue to improve. She said the department distributed more than $26 million dollars within three weeks of the stay at home order and $80 million dollars in the first year of the pandemic, without needed extra staff.