Pursuit's Take
The Department of Transportation has not established clear guidance for identifying, tracking, and reporting conference activity and, for the period OIG reviewed, did not report all reportable conferences.7 As a result, DOT’s total conference costs were understated. According to DOT, conference spending between March 2013 and September 2014 totaled almost $19 million. However, OIG identified conferences that should have been reported but were not.
OIG’s sample revealed $536,886 in funds that were obligated without approval and $140,104 in questioned costs, projecting, respectively, to $856,009 (4.5 percent) and $161,666 (0.9 percent) of the nearly $19 million total cost that DOT attributed to conference-related expenses.