New York State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli announced today the following audits have been issued:

City University of New York: Lehman College - Controls Over Bank Accounts (2014-S-69)

Auditors found weaknesses in the monitoring and authorization of bank accounts, which increase the risk that Lehman personnel could conduct transactions using unauthorized accounts. A review of Lehman’s accounts found that a non-tax-levy account contained tax-levy funds that Lehman officials should have transferred to New York state. As of March 31, 2015, these funds totaled over $1 million. Lehman officials subsequently remitted over $1 million of these funds to the state. Of the 72 payments (totaling $1,248,139) paid from five judgmentally selected bank accounts, 25 payments totaling $114,554 were either improper (did not comply with CUNY or state and New York City policies and procedures) or unsupported.

Empire State Development Corp. (ESD) Selected Aspects of the Minority and Women-Owned Business Enterprises (MWBE) Program (2014-S-13)

State agencies and public authorities must file a master goal plan or an update by Jan. 15 of each year. Such plans must also indicate the amount of budgeted expenditures available for MWBE participation. However, plans for 10 sampled ESD agencies were submitted late (one by more than five months), and six of the agencies did not explain why significant amounts of their budgets were exempted and excluded from MWBE participation. Further, there was no evidence ESD took actions to address these instances of non-compliance. For the audit period, 39 (46.9 percent) of the 83 files we requested were either missing mandatory and required documents used to certify MWBEs or the files could not be located.

Ogdensburg Bridge and Port Authority: Capital Planning and Maintenance (2015-S-70)

Although the authority has routinely developed four-year capital plans as required, the plans are incomplete and do not identify all of the authority’s needs. The authority estimates that the bridge needs at least $104.5 million for complete repainting and replacement of the approaches. However, the Authority has neither the funds to make the capital investment nor the means to secure the necessary funding elsewhere. Given the bridge’s extensive maintenance needs, including those resulting from accelerating deterioration in certain structural components, authority officials should formally assess the propriety of the current toll structure.

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