Issued January 2026
Recommendation follow-up 2025
The Multnomah County Auditor’s Office’s mission is to promote accountable and equitable county government. Our audit reports include recommendations for improvement, and county managers are responsible for taking corrective actions to address them. We follow up on the status of audit recommendations to support county government’s accountability.
We found that 40% of the audit recommendations evaluated in 2025 have been implemented.
The charts below show results of the status evaluations of recommendations for calendar year 2025.
Joint Office of Homeless Services: Providers were frustrated with contract management and communication
Percent implemented: 13%
Multnomah County Library: Employees raise serious concerns with security, workforce equity, and staffing
Percent implemented: 55%
Pandemic Funds: Management has policies and procedures in place to manage pandemic funds
Percent implemented: 60%
We recommend that Animal Services spay and neuter all eligible animals prior to adoption
Percent implemented: 0%
Which recommendations have not been implemented?
Our reports on the status of audit recommendations provide details on recommendations that management has implemented or is in the process of implementing.
This annual report highlights recommendations management has not implemented to continue encouraging management to implement them, if needed.
Not implemented indicates the auditee has not implemented, or does not intend to implement a recommendation.
Joint Office of Homeless Services (now Homeless Services Department): Providers were frustrated with contract management and communication
Recommendation: Program Specialists/Program Specialist Seniors have a conflict of interest in being both the primary advocate for homeless service providers and also the ones who hold them accountable for meeting performance measures. Joint Office management should modify the Program Specialist role so that this conflict of interest is eliminated.
Due Date: 1/1/2024
Recommendation: Not all homeless service providers and Joint Office staff are aware of the Joint Office’s strategic vision. The Joint Office executive management needs to communicate their strategic vision to providers and staff.
Due Date: 1/1/2024
Multnomah County Library: Employees raise serious concerns with security, workforce equity, and staffing
Recommendation: Champion safety committees as a place to address security issues.
Due Date: 1/1/2024
Note: Library leadership shared with us that they do not intend to implement this part of the recommendation. Library leadership, in consultation with the County Workplace Security Director, do not see the safety committees as a place to address security issues. Other efforts to collaborate between security and safety teams include the creation of a safety committee coordination team.
Pandemic Funds: Management has policies and procedures in place to manage pandemic funds
Recommendation: We recommend the Chief Financial Officer’s office develop a centralized detective control for identifying improper use of p-card transactions. A detective control is a procedure to identify errors or problems after they have occurred. This process should be in addition to Central Accounts Payable periodic audits and include a comparison of p-card vendors to the federal Systems for Award Management (SAM.gov) list. We recommend this process be performed at least quarterly.
Due Date: 12/31/2021
Note: There are other processes and controls that are in place or have been enhanced since the audit.
Recommendation: We recommend that the Health Department enhance their detective controls to ensure that routine reconciliations of vendor payments are performed, to help identify any mispayments, such as monthly contract reconciliations of vendor invoices for what has been paid compared to what has been invoiced, to date.
Due Date: 12/31/2021
Note: The Health Department chose not to implement this recommendation, because of the significant burden it would have on finance department resources. The Health Department is working to implement other efforts that they hope will help make a more robust review process to better evaluate spending.
Our recommendation status evaluation program is informed by the U.S. Government Accountability Office’s guidance on How to Get Action on Audit Recommendations (GAO/OP-9.2.1).