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Office of Community Oriented Policing Services Grants
to the Providence Police Department
Providence, Rhode Island

GR-70-03-007
August 2003
Office of the Inspector General


EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

The Office of the Inspector General, Audit Division, has completed an audit of grants awarded by the Office of Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) to the Providence, Rhode Island, Police Department (Providence). The purpose of the grants is to enhance community policing. Providence was awarded a total of $4,692,552 to hire 14 new police officers and redeploy the equivalent of 147.6 existing full-time police officers from administrative duties to community policing.

We found Providence to be in material non-compliance with COPS' grant requirements. We reviewed Providence's compliance with seven essential grant conditions and found weaknesses in only two of the seven areas we tested: reimbursement requests and officer redeployment. However, we found little evidence of officer redeployment into community policing despite the expenditure of over $2.7 million of MORE 95 and MORE 98 grant funds. As a result of the deficiencies identified below, we question $2,790,491 in grant funds received and recommend an additional $887,645 be put to better use.1

These items are discussed in detail in the Findings and Recommendations section of the report. Our audit objectives, scope and methodology appear in Appendix I.


Footnotes

  1. The Inspector General Act of 1988 contains our reporting requirements for questioned costs and funds to better use. However, not all findings are dollar-related. See Appendix III for a breakdown of our dollar-related findings and for definitions of questioned costs and funds to better use.