U.S. DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE

Office of Community Oriented Policing Services

Grants to the Talladega, Alabama, Police Department

GR-40-98-011

April 1998

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

The Office of the Inspector General, Audit Division, has completed an audit of three grants awarded by the U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS), to the Talladega, Alabama, Police Department (TPD). The TPD received grants of $333,959 to hire or rehire six additional sworn law enforcement officers under the Funding Accelerated for Smaller Towns (FAST) program and the Universal Hiring Program (UHP), and a grant of $58,000 to redeploy 3.9 officer full-time equivalents (FTEs) under the Making Officer Redeployment Effective (MORE) program. The purpose of the extra officers is to enhance community policing efforts.

In brief, our audit determined that the TPD:

- claimed $9,730 in excess reimbursements under the MORE grant.

- had not hired any of the six officers funded by the FAST and UHP grants. Therefore, $333,959 could be put to better use.

- redeployed only .3 of the officer FTEs funded by the MORE grant into community policing. Therefore, $42,740 could be put to better use.

- had not developed a formal plan to maintain the redeployment of officers.

- did not submit some monitoring reports to COPS and the Office of Justice Programs (OJP), submitted other monitoring reports late, and incorrectly reported total program outlays and the Federal share of outlays to OJP.

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