Operation Safe Home is administered by HUD’s OIG to combat violent crime and drug trafficking in public and assisted housing. It began as an anticrime initiative in February 1994 and was announced as a joint effort among HUD, the Department of Justice the Department of the Treasury, and the Office of National Drug Control Policy. To implement Operation Safe Home, the OIG—through its 11 district offices—establishes and participates in law enforcement task forces. Its partners include federal law enforcement agencies—such as the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA)—as well as state and local law enforcement agencies. The task forces investigate criminal activity in public and assisted housing, and OIG special agents conduct undercover operations, make arrests, and refer cases for criminal prosecution. As of December 2000, 280 task forces were active in numerous U.S. cities. In addition, under Operation Safe Home, the OIG facilitates the relocation of witnesses and their families who assist law enforcement efforts. According to the Inspector General’s September 1999 Semiannual Report to the Congress, the OIG had facilitated the relocation of 637 families since the beginning of Operation Safe Home. The OIG supports this activity by using HUD Section 8 vouchers set aside for this purpose. The HUD OIG has not effectively managed the Operation Safe Home funding earmarked by the Congress since fiscal year 1996. Whereas the OIG did not spend a substantial amount of the funds it allotted for Operation Safe Home law enforcement task forces between fiscal years 1996 and 2000, the OIG also estimates that--during that same period--it used other OIG funds to supplement the Operation Safe Home salaries and expenses allotment. In addition, the OIG did not have information on the amount of money allotted to and spent by each of its 280 task forces, and had only limited information on how this money was specifically spent. From fiscal year 1996 through 2001, the Congress earmarked $92.5 million to the HUD OIG to fund Operation Safe Home, and these funds are available until expended. The Congress began funding Operation Safe Home in fiscal year 1996 with $2.5 million and raised this to $10 million in fiscal year 1997. From fiscal year 1998 through 2001, the Congress annually earmarked $20 million to the OIG to administer Operation Safe Home. The OIG has allotted Operation Safe Home funds for two purposes: (1) expenses associated with law enforcement task forces such as overtime pay for local law enforcement, vehicle leasing, and training, and (2) salaries and expenses of OIG special agents working on Operation Safe Home drug and violent crime investigations and witness relocation activities. As figure 1 shows, in fiscal year 1996, the OIG allotted all of the appropriation—$2.5 million—for task force activities, and since fiscal year 1997, the OIG has split the appropriation evenly—50 percent for task force activities and 50 percent for salaries and expenses. The source of congressional funding for Operation Safe Home is the Public Housing Drug Elimination Program. The Congress established the Drug Elimination Program to provide grants to public housing authorities to reduce or eliminate drug-related crime in public housing developments. Eligible uses of this grant money include—but are not limited to— employing security personnel and making physical improvements to housing structures to increase security. As figure 2 illustrates, in fiscal year 2000, about 6 percent of the Drug Elimination Program’s appropriation was earmarked for the HUD OIG to fund Operation Safe Home. As figure 3 shows, the $20 million the OIG received in fiscal year 2000 for Operation Safe Home represented about 22 percent of the OIG’s budget for that fiscal year. The HUD OIG has not spent a substantial amount of the funds it allotted for Operation Safe Home task forces; conversely, it has expended all the funds it allotted to pay for the salaries and expenses of OIG special agents engaged in Operation Safe Home activities and has also used other OIG funds for this purpose. In particular, from fiscal year 1996 through 2000 (the last full fiscal year for which data are available) the OIG had not obligated about $10 million of the $37.5 million it allotted to fund Operation Safe Home law enforcement task forces. In addition, of the $27.5 million that had been obligated, about $8 million had not been expended by the end of fiscal year 2000. While these funds remain available to the OIG until expended, more than half of the unexpended funds were obligated in fiscal year 1999 or earlier, as shown in figure 4. We plan to review these unexpended balances as part of our budget justification review of HUD’s proposed fiscal year 2002 budget. The Inspector General told us that Operation Safe Home task force money is unobligated because the HUD OIG has received more funding than was needed. OIG officials stated that as a result, HUD’s proposed fiscal year 2002 budget request for Operation Safe Home was reduced from $20 million to $10 million, and that Operation Safe Home’s unobligated balances would finance task force activities through fiscal year 2002. In contrast to the HUD OIG not expending the task force allotment, the OIG estimates that it has used other OIG monies to pay for the salaries and expenses of special agents working on Operation Safe Home activities. Specifically, from fiscal year 1997 through fiscal year 2000 (the last full fiscal year for which data are available) the OIG allotted $35 million of Operation Safe Home earmarks for salaries and expenses. However, the OIG estimates that during this period it expended $38.9 million on salaries and expenses of special agents working on Operation Safe Home activities. Therefore, the OIG estimates that it used $3.9 million of other OIG funds—about 10 percent more than initially allotted—to pay for the salaries and expenses of special agents working on Operation Safe Home activities. The use of other OIG funds to pay for Operation Safe Home activities was permitted by law. Figure 5 illustrates the OIG's estimates of funds expended annually to pay for the salaries and expenses of OIG special agents engaged in Operation Safe Home activities. HUD OIG officials were able to provide only limited information on how the task force funds were spent. Specifically, while the OIG was able to supply overall obligation and expenditure data, it could not readily identify how much money was allotted to and obligated and expended by individual task forces. Furthermore, it could not readily provide information on what specific activities were funded. For example, HUD's accounting system could not accurately provide information on how much was expended for training and payment of overtime costs. OIG officials stated that while HUD's accounting system has specific expenditure levels—such as training and payment of overtime costs--that OIG staff rarely use and have not been required to use the more detailed levels. As figure 6 illustrates, in fiscal year 2000, 63 percent of the expenditures for task force activities were categorized as “Other.” The OIG is acting to improve accountability over funds allotted for task force activities. As a result of our review, the HUD OIG is instituting additional mechanisms to identify the funding allotted to and obligated and expended by each of its 280 task forces. The OIG has further advised its district offices to provide more detailed information on specific task force obligations and expenditures. In addition, in November 2000, the Inspector General placed some restrictions on the use of Operation Safe Home funds allotted for task force activities. These restrictions precluded the formation of additional task forces, although existing task forces continue to be funded and may request additional funding. OIG officials stated that the restrictions were necessary because of delays in contracting for the required audits of Operation Safe Home and due to allegations of misuse of funding at the OIG’s Denver office. When we completed our review, the required audit of Operation Safe Home was under way and was scheduled to be completed in July 2001, and the FBI and OIG were investigating the allegations in the Denver office (as discussed later in the report). The HUD OIG cannot accurately determine the number of arrests and convictions that have resulted from Operation Safe Home activities because the data it has maintained are unreliable. According to the OIG database, investigations stemming from Operation Safe Home have resulted in about 25,000 arrests and 500 convictions since 1994; however, these data are unreliable because they are not consistent, complete, or accurate. We found that the OIG lacked a single and reliable information system and instead used multiple data collection methods of questionable reliability. For example, the OIG: used narrative reports composed by OIG special agents to compile arrest and conviction statistics. However, the OIG had not developed guidance detailing the type of information that should be included in the narrative reports. As a result, OIG special agents could and did have differing interpretations on what to include. For example, while some OIG special agents told us they only counted arrests for which they were physically present, others counted all Operation Safe Home arrests executed by any task force participant. Also, some OIG special agents told us they only tracked federal convictions, while others tracked federal, state, and local convictions. compiled the narrative reports by highlighting discussions of arrests and convictions and then entered the data into a database. This method is highly prone to error because it relied on the interpretation of the individuals reading the narrative reports and manually identifying and transferring information. For example, we found at least 57 instances of apparent double entries of arrest data, potentially resulting in the OIG overreporting 600 arrests. maintained arrest and conviction data in its Investigator Case Management System database. This database was originally developed in 1980 to track the time and attendance of OIG special agents but was expanded in 1994 to track Operation Safe Home investigative data.