Reimbursement of Homeless Shelter Providers – Westhab Inc.’s Coachman Family Center (Follow-Up)

Issued Date
August 08, 2024
Agency/Authority
Temporary and Disability Assistance, Office of

Objective

To determine the extent of implementation of the six recommendations included in our initial audit report, Reimbursement of Homeless Shelter Providers Westhab Inc.’s Coachman Family Center (Report 2020-S-56).

About the Program

The Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance (OTDA) administers programs for the State’s low-income residents and provides support, supervision, and guidance to local departments of social services (Local Districts), including those that serve the homeless. OTDA’s funding of shelter services is administered through the Local Districts, comprising the New York City Department of Homeless Services and 57 county offices throughout the rest of the State. Local Districts annual claims submissions to OTDA for homeless housing was $2 billion or more for calendar years 2019 through 2022.

Since 1996, the Westchester County Department of Social Services (WCDSS) has contracted with the not-for-profit Westhab Inc. (Westhab) to operate Coachman Family Center (Coachman) as a certified shelter for families with children. Coachman, with capacity for 100 adult families, serves over 250 families per year. Westhab is the single largest provider of these services in Westchester County.

In order to effectively evaluate whether costs are eligible for reimbursement, OTDA requires Local Districts that reimburse shelter providers outside of New York City to submit shelters' operating budget annually by January 1. According to State regulations, OTDA will reimburse Local Districts, such as WCDSS, for the calendar year’s approved costs, which are adjusted based on their shelters’ actual costs.

OTDA, pursuant to its Administrative Manual, is responsible for reviewing each shelter’s operating budget, working with the Local Districts to ensure that all required documents have been included, and assessing budgeted operating costs to verify that they are reasonable and necessary. Upon making payments to their providers, Local Districts submit monthly claim packages to OTDA for reimbursement. Local Districts’ claim submissions must comply with OTDA’s Fiscal Reference Manual, which provides guidance on costs that are eligible for reimbursement.

The objective of our initial audit, issued on March 1, 2022, was to determine if OTDA adequately monitored and properly approved reimbursement of claims by homeless shelter providers, such as Westhab’s Coachman. Our audit covered the period January 2019 through December 2019 and select expenses from 2020. Overall, the audit found that OTDA was not adequately monitoring and properly approving reimbursements for Westhab’s homeless shelter program. Nor had OTDA established an effective budget review process for shelter budgets, which could result in costs exceeding approved levels or in the allocation of money year after year that historically had not been expended and that could have been used elsewhere. For calendar year 2019, we identified $1,304,695 in reported costs for Coachman that were improperly reimbursed.

Key Findings

OTDA officials made some progress in addressing the issues identified during the initial audit. Of the initial report’s six audit recommendations, two were implemented, one was partially implemented, and three were not implemented.

Key Recommendation

OTDA officials are requested, but not required, to provide information about any actions planned to address the unresolved issues discussed in this follow-up within 30 days of the report’s issuance.

Nadine Morrell

State Government Accountability Contact Information:
Audit Director
: Nadine Morrell
Phone: (518) 474-3271; Email: StateGovernmentAccountability@osc.ny.gov
Address: Office of the State Comptroller; Division of State Government Accountability; 110 State Street, 11th Floor; Albany, NY 12236