Last week the Chicago City Council passed an ordinance giving the Chicago Inspector General the power, for the first time, to investigate the Council itself. Before they passed the ordinance, however, they stripped it of the provision that would allow audit power, which the office already has for the executive branch of City government. According to this year’s Audit and Program Review Plan, “the OIG Audit and Program Review (APR) section supports the OIG mission by conducting independent, objective analysis and evaluation of municipal programs and operations, issuing public reports, and making recommendations to strengthen and improve the delivery of public services.
Audits are conducted “in accordance with generally accepted Government Auditing Standards (GAS or “Yellow Book,” December 2011 revision) established by the United States Government Accountability Office.”
In other words, these are normal, common accepted practices in government. The fact that City Council doesn’t want that is a bad sign for the integrity of the body.
Just for fun, I wanted to list the current audit & program work for 2016. The list is from November 2015, and it covers many of the fundamental topics that we care about in our city. The existence of an audit says nothing bad about any department— it’s just black-and-tackle good governance and oversight. Here’s the list:
- Department of Planning and Development’s (DPD) Affordable Housing Rehabilitation and
Construction - Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events’s (DCASE) Management of Special Events
- Chicago Department of Public Health (CDPH) Environmental Permitting and Law Enforcement
- Department of Buildings (DOB) Complaint-Based and Periodic Building Inspections
- DOB Electrical Inspections
- City’s Enforcement of the Chicago Base Wage Ordinance
- City of Chicago Language Access
- Chicago Building Code Accessibility Requirements
- Chicago Public Library (CPL) Staffing
- Department of Family & Support Services’s (DFSS) Oversight of WorkNet
- Construction and Demolition Debris Recycling
- Board of Elections Operations
- User Fees
- Local Records Act Compliance
- Public Building Commission (PBC) Change Order Review Process
- Chicago Department of Transportation (CDOT) Right of Way Management
- Department of Water Management’s (DWM) Management of Overtime
- DWM’s Management of Water and Sewer Construction
- Department of Streets and Sanitation’s (DSS) Oversight of the Multi-Unit Building Recycling
Program - Chicago Department of Aviation (CDA) Vendor Compliance with the City of Chicago Contractor
Policy - Chicago Police Department’s (CPD) Compliance with the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA)
- CPD Dashboard Cameras
- CPD Early Intervention System
- Chicago Fire Department’s (CFD) Management of Overtime
All hail the Office of the Chicago Inspector General.
