FEMA Grant Fraud and Waste from Inadequate Internal Controls

$10,000-$150,000 per procurement cycle from inflated pricing due to lack of competition; potential waste of equipment not needed • $100,000-$500,000+ per audit finding in unallowable costs or forced repayment; Loss of future FEMA grant eligibility if pattern repeats • $25,000-$500,000 per fiscal year in improper awards to unvetted or debarred vendors; audit findings requiring fund recovery

Academy Director maintains separate Excel sheets for labor, materials, students; manually cross-references during reporting; charges estimated percentages to grants without detailed time tracking • Coordinator maintains volunteer sign-up sheets and email confirmations only. Estimates volunteer hours using memory or incomplete logs. No verification of actual volunteer work performed. Submitted to FEMA as-is. • EMS Coordinator reviews timesheets manually in Excel, compares to rough memory of approved budgets, manually emails supervisors for clarification; some hours flagged but not systematically tracked