A bad grade for BWSR

For the second time in less than a year, the Minnesota Board of Water and Soil Resources received a failing grade from the legislative auditor — this time, for not living up to its financial management responsibilities.

An Office of the Legislative Auditor report determined that the board lacks “adequate internal controls over certain financial processes”; however, the report also states that BWSR generally complied with most finance-related laws.

The report, which was released in late-November, was discussed Feb. 26 by the House Watersheds, Wetlands and Buffers Subcommittee. No action was taken.

Among the key findings, the report states that the board:

• did not adequately administer its financial management duties;

• did not ensure that grantees met the legally mandated matching requirements;

• awarded grants to districts that did not provide comprehensive work plans;

• did not inspect wetland sites added to the wetland bank; and

• failed to prepare performance evaluation reports for contracted services.

“This is a pretty strong finding from us,” said Deputy Legislative Auditor Cecile Ferkul, who said that her office rarely deems an organization’s financial management to be inadequate.

The report comes on the heels of one released in January 2007 that criticized the board for exercising inadequate oversight of the state’s numerous local watershed management entities.

Executive Director John Jaschke said the board agreed with most of the findings and intends to do better in the future; however, he also emphasized that there was no misappropriation or misdirection of state funds.

“We need to do some things different and better,” Jaschke said. He mentioned more extensive documentation of financial transactions and building what he called “planned redundancy” into the board’s financial management as examples of possible improvements.

Subcommittee Chairman Rep. Rick Hansen (DFL-South St. Paul) said it was “very important” that BWSR correct the problems outlined in the report — especially since the Legislature is “looking at providing a significant amount of money” to the board in this year’s bonding bill.