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Carson finds over half a TRILLION in HUD accounting errors.

Hawkeye10 said:
The degree to which Obama did not give a damn about good government is going to come out, and it is another in a long list of reasons why his historical reputation is going to be dog ****. The degree to which he gained a cult following in spite of the poor quality of his work is going to be an embarrassment America suffers.
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Obama will be seen as a 'meh' president. Nothing more, nothing less.
 
Hawkeye10 said:
He could have done it 8 years ago.

So much bad government was done on his watch, and he will get the blame, because he rarely acted like he cared.
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The audit has been done every year since 1990.
 
longview said:
I am guessing the 516 billion was really 516 million, or a little over 10 % of Hud's annual budget.
It is possible the person writing the article, saw a big number and did not count the zeros.
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Nope, what the auditors here did was count up the dollar amount of every single error in the annual report(s), apparently including a bunch of restatements that were included in the 2016 annual report (albeit somewhat buried, as "Note 30"), and it came to "$516 billion."

HUD did not blow through $516 billion that can't be accounted for. Rather, they got sloppy with some of their accounting, and got called out for it.
 
Visbek said:
Or:

- You're attributing a report to Carson that was completed before he was confirmed
- You aren't being clear at all in what you were saying in that post
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Which the post you quoted has me saying that I conceded the attribution. So, gain, I don't get the point you're making for the 3rd time.

Or, they are saying:

• The move to an FSSP screwed things up
• GNMA and FHA provided info late
• HUD agreed a more thorough audit was required
• FIFO accounting methods were not appropriate for HUD
• HUD wasn't properly adhering to FASAB standards
etc

There are definitely problems -- which is why the government already stipulates someone needs to audit agencies like this. I'm not seeing a lot that says "no one is cooperating with the HUD OIG."
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" (1) the Office of General Counsel’s refusal to sign the management representation letter,(2) HUD’s improper use of cumulative and first-in, first-out budgetary accounting methods of disbursing community planning and development program funds,(3) the $4.2 billion in nonpooled loan assets from Ginnie Mae’s stand-alone financial statements that we could not audit due to inadequate support,(4) the improper accounting for certain HUD assets and liabilities, and (5) material differences between HUD’s subledger and general ledger accounts."

Doesn't support your assumptions.



Or, you don't actually understand what you're reading.

So, let's be clear. HUD's budget is, again, around $50 billion a year. What is it that you believe happened here? And do you understand that Carson had nothing to do with this audit?
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So you read it differently? It doesn't say it's off by over $500 billion? As to your final question, again, you failed to read what you quoted.
 
longview said:
I am guessing the 516 billion was really 516 million, or a little over 10 % of Hud's annual budget.
It is possible the person writing the article, saw a big number and did not count the zeros.
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Possibly. As it stands, that's what they have on their own .gov website.
 
Hawkeye10 said:
He could have done it 8 years ago.

So much bad government was done on his watch, and he will get the blame, because he rarely acted like he cared.
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joG said:
You mean the audit took eight years?
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How does one do a 8 year audit of two years? The audit was FY 2015 and FY 2016....
 
TheDemSocialist said:
How does one do a 8 year audit of two years? The audit was FY 2015 and FY 2016....
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It looks like it could be a matter of a proper audit and that, previously, the audit was not cooperated with. For example, the DoD has not been audited and seems to be able to refuse it. Say the matter gets pushed and an audit commences. How far or accurate or successful will the audit be, with such a large institution, if there is no cooperation.
 
longview said:
I am guessing the 516 billion was really 516 million, or a little over 10 % of Hud's annual budget.
It is possible the person writing the article, saw a big number and did not count the zeros.
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No. They really are talking about billions. I'm currently scanning the audit and just came across a note that says "The remaining $119.1 billion in errors was due to inappropriate rounding adjustments. We found several instances in which rounding was performed to the nearest billion and hundred billion,..."

It's also citing data entry errors, failure to restate balances, etc. From an accounting standpoint that basically means "we generally made this stuff up".
 
Lutherf said:
No. They really are talking about billions. I'm currently scanning the audit and just came across a note that says "The remaining $119.1 billion in errors was due to inappropriate rounding adjustments. We found several instances in which rounding was performed to the nearest billion and hundred billion,..."

It's also citing data entry errors, failure to restate balances, etc. From an accounting standpoint that basically means "we generally made this stuff up".
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I was wondering if you'd look into this. IIRC, this type of thing is in your wheelhouse, right?
 
Fishking said:
I was wondering if you'd look into this. IIRC, this type of thing is in your wheelhouse, right?
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Kind of. I'm a little busy right now to get too involved but since my software needed a few minutes to update (again) I figured I'd take a quick peek.
 
Kobie said:
I kind of find this a smidge hard to believe, since HUD's entire budget is ~$50B.
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That's why it's so HUGE to have found so much. They must have been really keeping their pennies together for a long time.
 
joG said:
That's why it's so HUGE to have found so much. They must have been really keeping their pennies together for a long time.
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Or, it's a wrong number. Do you REALLY think this is so HUGE that they found a discrepancy equal to TEN TIMES HUD's annual budget? Or do you think maybe this just might be wrong?
 
Kobie said:
Or, it's a wrong number. Do you REALLY think this is so HUGE that they found a discrepancy equal to TEN TIMES HUD's annual budget? Or do you think maybe this just might be wrong?
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Has the DoD ever been audited? How much money do they lose track of? I don't think it's inconceivable in a large government program.
 
Fishking said:
Has the DoD ever been audited? How much money do they lose track of? I don't think it's inconceivable in a large government program.
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Ten times the annual budget.
 
Kobie said:
Ten times the annual budget.
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I hear you but raise you massive government corruption being a cultural and systemic norm.
 
Fishking said:
I hear you but raise you massive government corruption being a cultural and systemic norm.
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Well, I raise you unicorn farts and pixie dust, since you apparently find this wrong but believable.
 
Wasn't there a sopranos ep that revolved greatly around this? The entire scam was to use HUD funds as kickbacks
 
Kobie said:
Well, I raise you unicorn farts and pixie dust, since you apparently find this wrong but believable.
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Lol...all I can say is that the numbers are there and are straight from the official gov sources. Can I have the pixie dust now? You can keep the unicorn farts.
 
Fishking said:
I hear you but raise you massive government corruption being a cultural and systemic norm.
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I think you're screwed since the 'he's innocent' routine for solving a financial imbalance failed.
 
Fishking said:
Lol...all I can say is that the numbers are there and are straight from the official gov sources. Can I have the pixie dust now? You can keep the unicorn farts.
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This is such an obvious typographical error that it's hardly worth discussing.
 
TheDemSocialist said:
How does one do a 8 year audit of two years? The audit was FY 2015 and FY 2016....
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My understanding is that this was a special independent audit done because the HUD IG refused to sign off because the books were such a wreck these years. Obama could have and should have demanded a full special audit in his first year though, because a bright boy like him certainly had to be aware by then what a wreck this department was. I am not aware that this was done.
 
azgreg said:
The audit has been done every year since 1990.
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By the HUD IG, yes I know.

This one was bigger, and was done by someone else as I understand the situation.
 
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