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Office of Community Oriented Policing Services
Grants to the Spokane County Sheriff's Department
Washington

GR-90-00-016
June 2000
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 to the Spokane County Sheriff's Department (SCSD), Washington. The purpose of the grants is to enhance community policing. The SCSD was awarded a total of $2,261,250 to hire 30 new deputy sheriffs and redeploy the equivalent of 0.6 existing full-time deputy sheriffs from administrative duties to community policing.

We reviewed the SCSD's compliance with eight essential grant conditions. We found the grantee's budgeting, hiring, redeployment, retention plan, and implementation of community policing to be acceptable. However, we found weaknesses in three other areas as identified below. As a result, we question $3,437.1

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


Footnote

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.