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 Massachusetts Commission on the Status of Women (MCSW) for the period July 1, 2017 through June 30, 2019.
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; the conclusion we reached regarding each objective; and, if applicable, where each objective is discussed in the audit findings.
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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 controls that we determined to be relevant to the objectives by reviewing MCSW’s mission statement, policies, and procedures, as well as conducting interviews with key personnel. Additionally, we performed the procedures described below.
Commissioner Appointments
We obtained and reviewed all the letters that MCSW disseminated during our audit period to the authorities that appoint its commissioners to notify them of commissioners’ expiring terms. We reviewed all the commissioner appointment letters MCSW received from these appointing authorities and reconciled the names of the individuals who were either newly appointed or reappointed to various MCSW source documents, including a spreadsheet MCSW maintained that listed commissioner appointments.
Open Meeting Law Compliance
We requested copies of Certificates of Receipt of Open Meeting Law Materials for all 30 MCSW commissioners who served during the audit period and were subject to the requirements of Section 20(h) of Chapter 30A of the General Laws. We reviewed this documentation and determined whether MCSW received a Certificate of Receipt of Open Meeting Law Materials from each appointed commissioner as required by Section 20(h) of Chapter 30A of the General Laws.
Certification of Online Training Program Completion
We requested all copies of the certificates of completion of online training on Section 28 of Chapter 268A of the General Laws for the 30 MCSW commissioners who were subject to the requirements of that law during the audit period. We tested the records for 100% (all 30) of the commissioners to determine whether each commissioner completed training within the prescribed 30 days of being appointed or reappointedand every 2 years thereafter.
MCSW Regional Commission Bylaws
We obtained and reviewed bylaws for each of MCSW’s 11 regional commissions to determine whether they were up to date and consistent with the requirements of MCSW’s vision and goals. In addition, we reviewed meeting minutes from 9 regional commissions to ascertain whether regional commission bylaws had been regularly reviewed, amended as necessary, and approved. We did find some insignificant issues in this area, which we discussed with MCSW management. MCSW officials stated that they would implement process improvements to ensure that all bylaws were reviewed and approved in a timely manner.
Data Reliability
To determine the reliability of data on the MCSW spreadsheet of commissioner appointments during the audit period, we interviewed management personnel who were responsible for the source data. Further, we used electronic spreadsheet functionality to identify hidden cells and rows or other irregularities and noted no exceptions. To determine the completeness of the MCSW spreadsheet of commissioner appointments, we compared 5 of the 30 listed commissioners to internal documents (appointment and reappointment records) maintained by MCSW’s executive director. We determined that the MCSW spreadsheets were sufficiently reliable for the purpose of this audit. For the test of MCSW regional commission bylaws, we received meeting minutes for only 9 of the regional commissions, which did not reflect the minutes of all meetings held during the audit period. However, the ones we received were adequate for us to conclude on the objective.
| Date published: | August 27, 2020 |
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