Overview
In accordance with Section 12 of Chapter 11 of the Massachusetts General Laws, the Office of the State Auditor has conducted a performance audit of certain activities of the Department of Telecommunications and Cable (DTC) for the period January 1, 2019 through December 31, 2020.
We conducted this performance audit in accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards. Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain sufficient, appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable basis for our findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. We believe that the evidence obtained provides a reasonable basis for our findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives.
Below is a list of our audit objectives, indicating each question we intended our audit to answer and the conclusion we reached regarding each objective.
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Objective |
Conclusion |
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Yes |
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Yes |
To achieve our audit objectives, we gained an understanding of the internal control environment in the areas related to the objectives by reviewing applicable DTC policies and procedures, as well as DTC’s internal control plan; conducting interviews with management and other employees; and performing walkthroughs of the processes related to DTC’s role in the State 911 Department’s budgetary proceedings. We also evaluated the operating effectiveness of the relevant controls for the review of Information Requests issued to the State 911 Department as well as the review of Final Orders. To obtain sufficient, appropriate evidence to address our audit objectives, we performed the following procedures.
Adoption of Rules
To determine whether DTC had adopted rules that ensured that only prudently incurred expenses would be funded with the revenue generated by the surcharge in accordance with Section 18H(b) of Chapter 6A of the General Laws, we interviewed employees to gain an understanding of DTC’s interpretation of the statutory requirement and what measures had been implemented.
We asked about policies and procedures pertaining to the application of the “Standard of Review” section of DTC’s Final Orders during budgetary proceedings. We compared the “Standard of Review” section to Sections 18A through 18J of Chapter 6A, and Sections 14A and 15E of Chapter 166, of the General Laws for the entire population of State 911 Department budgetary proceedings conducted during the audit period. We looked for evidence that the “Standard of Review” section included language and attributes relevant to the General Laws’ requirements for enhanced 911 services and programs, including DTC’s obligation to assess whether certain expenses funded would be prudently incurred. We also reviewed each expense line item from the Exhibit A included in DTC Docket Filings 19-2 and 20-1. We requested supporting documentation for the State 911 Department’s responses to DTC’s Information Requests and Record Requests for each line item amount. However, DTC did not require supporting documentation from the State 911 Department, because that department’s responses to DTC are given under oath during budgetary proceedings. We provided verbal recommendations to DTC on how to enhance this process.
Compliance with Procedural Rules
To determine whether DTC conducted State 911 Department budgetary proceedings in accordance with 207 CMR 1, we conducted interviews and walkthroughs with DTC to gain an understanding of the elements of its adjudicatory proceedings. We requested policies and procedures and reviewed the procedure notes provided by management. Based on how DTC described its review of the State 911 Department, we created an outline of the process and compared it to the sections of 207 CMR 1 that are relevant to budgetary proceedings.
To test for DTC’s compliance with 207 CMR 1, we reviewed the following investigation documents filed in both of the State 911 Department budgetary proceedings from the audit period for evidence that the relevant procedural rules were followed: Petitions, Service Lists, Notices of Intent, Orders of Notice, Notices of Public Hearing, Proofs of Publication, Notices of Intervention (if applicable), Information Requests, Responses to Information Requests, Hearing Transcripts, Record Requests, Responses to Record Requests, and Final Orders.
Compliance with Statutory Timeframes
To determine whether DTC notified the State 911 Department of its intent to investigate within the 20 days allowed by statute, we compared the dates the petitions were submitted to the dates the Orders of Notice were issued to the State 911 Department for the two proceedings conducted during the audit period.
To determine whether DTC issued its decisions about the State 911 Department petitions within the 90 days allowed by statute, we compared the dates the petitions were submitted to the dates the Final Orders were issued for the two proceedings conducted during the audit period.
Data Reliability
Data for this audit were in the form of investigation documents filed during DTC’s proceedings. These were obtained from docket filing folders maintained on DTC’s shared drive. DTC management provided copies of investigation documents (including, but not limited to, State 911 Department petitions, Orders of Notice, Proofs of Publication, Information and Record Requests, hearing transcripts, and Final Orders) filed during fiscal years 2018 through 2021. To determine the population of proceedings, we asked about the number of State 911 Department petitions that DTC reviewed during the audit period. We confirmed that there were two by reviewing the completed filings in the “Department Orders and Rulings” appendix to DTC’s fiscal year 2019 and fiscal year 2020 annual reports. We interviewed knowledgeable staff members about employee access and permissions regarding the docket filings and saved documents. We observed demonstrations of staff members accessing the DTC email account used for receiving investigation documents and saving to the shared drive. To assess data accuracy, we traced all 28 investigation documents to their source emails. We verified that the content of investigation documents we received from DTC matched the original email attachments. To assess completeness, we traced documents from source emails to investigation documents. Based on the results of these procedures, we determined the data to be sufficiently reliable for the purpose of this audit.
Conclusion
Our audit revealed no significant instances of noncompliance that must be reported under generally accepted government auditing standards.
| Date published: | May 3, 2022 |
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