For a lot of voters, spending measures on the poll are judged by their relative deserves after which largely forgotten after the election.
A recent report by the King County Auditor’s Workplace on parks funding underscores the significance of monitoring levy and different public {dollars} to make sure they fulfill guarantees.
King County Parks’ grant packages expanded dramatically, rising from $3 million in 2017 to greater than $100 million anticipated from 2026 to 2031. Most comes from the $1.45 billion, six-year King County Parks Levy, which 72% of voters accredited final August. The Instances editorial board endorsed the measure.
The grants are meant to assist investments in parks, trails, open areas, leisure services and programming. Primarily based on the previous few years, they ranged from $2,000 to greater than $2 million.
The audit, launched on Jan. 13, decided: “The Parks Division has not but translated high-level objectives offered within the Parks Levy into particular and measurable aims to information its grants program and doesn’t sufficiently monitor particular person grant outcomes, limiting its means to successfully handle this system and growing the danger of misallocating sources.”
With out correct monitoring, the Parks Division “can’t consider its efficiency, use associated insights to enhance operations, or use that data to reveal how grant funds obtain levy objectives to the general public,” in accordance with the report.
The audit checked out 288 grants awarded in 2023 and 2024. A deep dive into 25 grants included reviewing agreements, budgets, scopes of labor, invoices and supporting documentation.
Auditors didn’t examine the chances of fraud, and no proof of fraud, waste, or abuse have been noticed. “Nevertheless, due to gaps within the Parks Division’s monetary practices, we couldn’t verify that each one grantee funds have been in keeping with program intent,” they wrote.
On a optimistic observe, Parks employed two supervisors for the grants crew, clarified some roles and duties, renewed efforts to replace its insurance policies and procedures, and improved the templates that it offers to grantees.
As a part of its report, the auditor drafted 11 suggestions. The county Division of Pure Assets and Parks concurred with all of them.
With so many spending measures on the poll and authorities increasing so quickly in recent times, there’s an “approve it and neglect it” mentality amongst a lot of the general public. Understandably so.
The auditor’s report — and former examinations of questionable spending by the county Department of Community and Human Services — underscores the necessity for fixed and thorough oversight to make sure {dollars} are well-spent and levies obtain measurable objectives.
That must be a high precedence for each new King County Government Girmay Zahilay and your entire King County Council.
