Boardman Local School DistrictLocal Government

Non-Federal entities must establish and maintain effective internal controls over Federal awards that provide reasonable assurance that the non-Federal entity is managing Federal awards in compliance with Federal statutes, regulations, and the terms and conditions of the Federal award. The District participated in Child Nutrition Cluster programs, for which the federal government reimburses the District for eligible children. During the school year, the School District is required to establish a child's eligibility to receive program benefits. The District accepted online applications for free and reduced meals, with which eligibility was determined based on several factors, including, but not limited to family size and income. PaySchools, the District’s Point of Sale (POS) software, selects the student to be verified based on the number of online/paper applications received. The Food Service Supervisor is required to verify income eligibility with the application signer. If income documentation is not received or the income documentation is not below the USDA guidelines for free/reduced lunches, the Food Service Supervisor is to notify the application signer that there will be a change in eligibility status and report those changes to the Ohio Department of Education and Workforce (DEW). These changes must also be made to the POS software system. The District received applications in paper and online through PaySchools to determine eligibility for free and reduced meals. Testing identified 5 of 60 applications, or 8.3% were not reviewed by the District to ensure PaySchools made the proper determination. Further testing revealed the District received 2,227 applications through PaySchools, 1,615 of which were direct certified, leaving the remaining 612 applications subject to District review. Testing identified 1 of 612 applications or .16% did not maintain documentation supporting District reviews or approvals over program eligibility requirements. This is the result of the District not establishing procedures in place over online applications to ensure the system determined the proper eligibility status based on the information provided in the application. Failure to implement controls over all eligibility applications may result in ineligible students receiving benefits and may result in questioned costs and reduced program funding. The District should implement control procedures for PaySchools applications to help ensure students are properly marked as paid, free, reduced, or denied.