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Title: Joint letter from Fraud Prevention and Oversight Committee members and Ways and Means Committee co-chairs to members of finance committees
Article Date: 3/26/2025
Source:
Author: Kristin Robbins, Dave Pinto, Patti Anderson, Steve Elkins, Walter Hudson, Emma Greenman, Marion Rarick, Isaac Schultz
Type: Other
URL:
File: Fraud_Ways_Letter.pdf 

Text:
Dear Colleagues,

As members of the Fraud Prevention & State Agency Oversight Policy Committee, and Co-Chairs of
the House Ways & Means Committee we write with an important request to our colleagues on finance
committees as you begin to build budgets in your respective policy areas. Specifically, when you
appropriate funds to private entities, we urge you to strongly consider having agencies use a
competitive process to select those entities, rather than directly naming them in law.

This request is consistent with testimony and discussion in our Committee, as well as repeated
recommendations dating as far back as 2007, when the Office of the Legislative Auditor urged:

"To ensure an open and fair grantee selection process, the Legislature should not mandate
grant recipients in law but allow agencies to select recipients through a competitive process."

The OLA has since (2023) further noted that state agencies provide "less oversight of legislatively
named grants than competitively awarded grants, since the funding is required to be awarded
regardless.

With competitive grants, the Legislature identifies a policy priority and an amount of money to address
it - a core legislative function. Applications by entities to address that priority, however, are best
reviewed through a competitive process, with consistent and thorough vetting by knowledgeable
professionals with direct experience in the relevant field, and in accordance with state grants
management standards that require an RFP, a pre-award risk assessment, including a review of
financials and capacity. All of this ensures that the funds are awarded to the entity or entities best able
to carry out the legislative intent.

We want to reassure you that a shift away from direct legislative appropriations need not diminish our
role in guiding funding to meet the unique needs of our communities. Competitive grants can and
should be tailored with specific parameters - such as type of service, population served, or geographic
focus-to ensure alignment with our policy priorities. Guidelines. and reviewers should ensure that
smaller organizations and those selling underrepresented communities are not disadvantaged or
overlooked.

Direct appropriations may be the best fit for some circumstances, such as where there is only one
private entity that can meet the identified need. But this should be the rare exception, rather than a
general practice. Additionally, the entity should be specified by name rather than using a session-law
description for which only one entity could qualify.

Please don't hesitate to reach out to us if you have any questions. Thanks for your consideration of
this request and for your hard work in crafting a state budget.

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