U.S. DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE

Audit Report

Office of Community Oriented Policing Services

Grants to the New Haven, Connecticut Police Department

GR-70-98-009

December 1998

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

The Office of the Inspector General, Audit Division, has completed an audit of grants awarded by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), Office of Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS), to the New Haven Police Department (New Haven). New Haven was awarded a total of $2,187,556 in COPS grants to hire 25 new sworn police officers and redeploy 6.3 full-time-equivalent (FTE) sworn police officers from administrative duties to community policing.

Based on our audit, we found that New Haven properly managed the COPS grants:

• Since the inception of the COPS grants, the number of officers budgeted has not decreased below 1994, the year before the grant.

• New Haven appeared to be making a good-faith effort to fill officer vacancies.

• Local matching funds were appropriately provided from funds not already budgeted for law enforcement purposes.

However, we found the following weaknesses with regard to meeting the conditions of the grant:

• New Haven did not always submit timely and accurate monitoring reports.

• New Haven did not increase the number of officers performing community policing activities by the number of officers funded under the grant.

These items are discussed in the Findings and Recommendations section of the report. Our Scope and Methodology appear in the Appendix.

#####