What would you do to ensure that the public has faith in the independence of the auditor from the rest of the city?
I would continue to perform independent audits of each city department and make our reports available to the public by all channels available as I am currently doing. I would also continue to exert my independence by speaking up when I believe an action to be taken could put the city at risk.
An example of this is when I spoke up at the City Council meeting regarding the city allocating $23 million to Urban Commons for critical and urgent repair work on the Queen Mary. I requested the City Council to allow me time to review the item before providing the funds because it appeared as though the city was the only entity with funds at risk. However, the majority of the council chose to vote in favor of the item despite my warning.
In addition, I will continue to exert my independence when I disagree with a City Council vote. An example of this is when the City Council voted against a council item requesting an audit of the City’s Business Improvement Districts (BIDs). I felt that BIDs were and are an important part of the city, therefore, I decided to initiate an audit of the BIDs despite the City Council’s vote not to audit them.
Our BIDs Audit turned out to be a very successful audit with many recommendations that the BIDs appreciated and used to strengthen their operations. Our BID Audit also won a national award and has been used as a blueprint for other BIDs throughout the country. The BID Audit and award can be viewed at www.CityAuditorLauraDoud.com.
What departments or programs would you target for an audit? Why?
My focus would be on the Water Department, Department of Public Works and Parks, Recreation and Marine.
1. Water Department: I would monitor the rates, reserves, and plans for rebates.
2. Department of Public Works: I would look at how the city is currently maintaining and fixing our streets and alleyways. The objective of the audit would be to determine the effectiveness of street and alley improvement projects and to assess whether there is a strategic plan to address the poor conditions.
3. Parks, Recreation and Marine: I would review how the city is maintaining and fixing our park facilities and playground equipment. The objective of the audit would be to determine if Long Beach parks meet safety performance expectations and assess the appropriateness and equitability of resources dedicated to park safety.
In addition, my office’s work plan will continue to be developed with the public’s interest foremost in mind and how best to provide the most value to meet the needs of the public. I will continue to attend community events and make myself accessible and available to listen, receive feedback, and answer questions of public concerns. I will continue to welcome audit requests and project suggestions.
A lot of the auditor’s work, while posted to the city website, goes unnoticed by the public. What would you do to make sure your office has a more meaningful relationship with residents to ensure your work is accessible to them?
Increasing awareness and engagement with the public has been a top priority of mine throughout my service. I will continue to communicate through all media outlets available to strengthen relationships with the residents and to make our work easily understandable and accessible.
While I have served as the city auditor, my team and I have updated the office’s website at CityAuditorLauraDoud.com, established the MyAuditorApp, and created social media channels including Twitter.com/lbcityauditor, Instagram.com/lbcityauditor, and Facebook.com/LBCityAuditor. Through all of these channels we have been able to increase awareness of our work and make it easy for the public to engage with our office.
During my term as city auditor I have spoken in every council district at their council community meetings and have also spoken at many Neighborhood Association Meetings to share the relevance and the value of our work with the community. We have created fact sheets that summarize our audits in order to make it easy to read and understand our work. I have received positive feedback from the residents regarding these fact sheets. These fact sheets are available on our website at www.CityAuditorLauraDoud.com.
I also enjoy attending community events such as Beach Streets and Concerts in the Park and sharing our work with the many stakeholders in attendance. I will continue to attend as many events as possible and make myself available to talk about our work and listen to feedback.
What do you think the mission of the city auditor is and how do you think you can accomplish that?
The current mission of the city auditor’s office is to create real, positive change within our city through independent audits and fraud investigations.
We are accomplishing this mission by continuing to perform audits of every city department and making reasonable, useful, and worthwhile recommendations while continuously focusing on increasing and protecting the city’s revenues and safeguarding the city’s assets. We also operate our Fraud Hotline. Our office creates a case for every tip received and investigates those cases with sufficient basis.
Our audit recommendations have brought in significant additional revenues, cost savings, and other important recommendations to the city. Some examples include:
● More money for parks, public pools and recreation classes (Parks, Recreation and Marine Revenue Collection Audit)
● Additional funding for city beaches and waterways (Harbor Initiative Audit)
● Enhanced security over the city’s towing cash (Towing Operations Audit)
● New software that tracks parking citation payments (Parking Citations Audit)
● Oil revenue spent on public safety (Oil Production Tax Audit)
● Library materials and programs in languages other than English (Library Services Audit)