• Bob Casey uncovered sweetheart deals and abuses totaling nearly $5
million in three special audits of the state's procurement process.
Political cronies of the Governor were rewarded with sole source, no-bid
contracts and lucrative land deals.
• He found over $3.5 million in Medical Assistance payments to people
who were ineligible for the program because they were either incarcerated
or dead.
• He exposed the Department of Labor & Industry's appalling lack
of oversight and enforcement of Pennsylvania's prevailing wage law. His performance audit found that L&I routinely destroyed complaint
files in violation of its own records retention policies; had no legitimate or
accurate means to track prevailing wage complaints or their resolution; and
provided little or no oversight of the investigative process.
Documentation was so poor that L&I could not verify whether workers who
filed prevailing wage complaints ever received the money they were owed.
• He conducted a performance audit of the Kvaerner/Philadelphia Naval
Shipyard project that exposed an economic development deal worth
nearly half a billion dollars in government largesse and millions of tax
dollars in extravagant, wasteful perks for foreign executives, including European vacations, luxury cars, and even a $2,000 swing set. Casey
offered 45 recommendations to protect taxpayers and workers in future economic
development deals.
• He conducted an investigation of the Ben Franklin Technology Center of
Western Pennsylvania that found millions of dollars intended for technology
grants to small businesses were, in fact, spent on luxurious vacations, gourmet
meals, fancy parties and gifts. A follow-up review found that many
of Casey's 15 recommendations to improve oversight of the program had been implemented. The Center's former CEO and Vice President - whom Casey said led a "wildy extravagant, grossly self-indulgent life" - served federal prison time for their crimes.
• Bob Casey prompted PennDOT to eliminate extravagant employee recognition
programs after an audit found they cost taxpayers $700,000 in one year alone.
• He conducted a special audit of the Department of Conservation and
Natural Resources' State Park Reservation System that exposed
the agency's poor management, cost overruns, lax security and delays. These problems resulted in nearly $500,000 in unnecessary costs. Another audit uncovered a questionable real estate deal that benefited the
mother-in-law of a top DCNR official.
• He conducted an investigation that found the Department of Public
Welfare paid over $500,000 to a firm that failed to provide adequate security
at a vacant state hospital.
• Casey's auditors uncovered two corporate tax errors totaling nearly $1.3
billion.
• Bob Casey found that Northwest Pennsylvania Technical Institute awarded
degrees and technical skills certificates to just 119 students over 10
years, despite receiving nearly $35 million in state funds to
provide crucial job training to 40,000 adults.
• His 1998 investigation of Lincoln University found hundreds of thousands
of dollars in mismanagement and waste and misuse of
University employees and resources for personal gain. It also documented
a pervasive disregard for sound business practices and school policies.
• Bob Casey prompted reforms in Philadelphia Traffic Court after an
audit found that the Court failed to collect 80% of fines and penalties -
nearly half a billion dollars - on outstanding traffic violations
in a three-year period.
• He urged the Public Utility Commission to improve its consumer
complaint hotline after a performance audit found that 90
percent of more than seven million customer calls went unanswered.
• He called for the hiring of additional prison guards after an audit
found that overtime in state prisons cost taxpayers more than $25 million a
year.
• He conducted a special investigation of the Hazardous Materials
Management (HazMat) Program which found waste, misuse of funds,
and mismanagement at both the state and local level.
• He conducted a special audit that found apparent conflicts of
interest in the Department of Environmental Protection's "Growing
Greener" grant program.
• Bob Casey conducted a joint investigation with the District Attorney of Beaver
County that led to hundreds of counts of theft totaling nearly $50,000
against the former Executive Director of Family Services of Beaver County, Inc. He was sentenced to two years probation and agreed to pay restitution to
the agency.
• He exposed an $11 million stockpile of public funds in the Harrisburg
Volunteer Firefighters' Relief Association. The VFRA refused to disclose
its members to auditors, but counted among them men who belonged to a fire
company that closed 63 years ago. Several other Casey investigations
of VFRAs uncovered tens of thousands of dollars in waste, fraud &
abuse.
"He's a solid advocate for Pennsylvanians and fiscally
responsible government."
Philadelphia Inquirer, October 16, 2000
• Bob Casey took the state's two largest public pension funds - the
State Employees' Retirement System (SERS) and the Public School Employees'
Retirement System (PSERS) to Commonwealth Court to force their
compliance with a performance audit of their investment operations.
Throughout a nearly three-year legal battle, Casey had the backing of the House
of Representatives, dozens of newspaper editorial boards, and retiree groups. In November 2003, Casey won a major victory when the Court unanimously
rejected the Funds' argument that the Auditor General lacked the legal
authority to conduct performance audits. The lawsuit was finally settled
in April 2005 (after Casey took office as State Treasurer and became a member
of both Funds' boards) when the Funds agreed to settle the lawsuit and allow a
performance audit of their investment operations to be conducted.
• As early as July 2002, Casey urged the Governor and the State Treasurer
to join him in developing a new state policy to protect Pennsylvania
investors and billions of dollars in state investments from the
devastating effects of conflicts of interest which may develop when financial
firms provide both investment advise and investment banking services.
• At Casey's urging, the SERS Board in November 2002 adopted
investment protection principles to better protect state taxpayer and
retirement funds. The adoption of these principles sent
a strong message to investment advisors and money managers doing business with
the pension fund that they are expected to adhere to the highest ethical
standards.
• Bob Casey in 2002 also called on the Governor to strengthen Pennsylvania's
Contractor Responsibility Program to provide for the debarment or
suspension of any state contractor that violates federal or state securities
laws. Casey specifically urged the Governor to deny state work to any company that
engages in accounting fraud, misstates its earnings or issues erroneous
financial statements.
• He launched a new audit program that found $7.3 million from the Tobacco
Settlement Fund was improperly paid to hospitals for uncompensated care
services. At the same time, Casey identified several hospitals that were
underpaid $4.3 million for certain eligible expenses. Casey recommended
- and the legislature agreed - that the remaining $3 million would be used
to reduce the waiting lists for the Commonwealth's subsidized health insurance
plan for low-income adults.
• In 2003, Bob Casey questioned the actuarial soundness of
Pennsylvania's Tuition Account Program (TAP) after an audit he
conducted at the request of the State Treasurer found that the TAP fund had:
· a $26 million deficit;
· a $40 million loss in net assets; and
· liabilities resulting from new business that exceeded by $8 million the
assets and income provided by this new business.
• Bob Casey warned that TAP's future competitiveness may be threatened
if it continued to accrue significant unfunded liabilities which it then
attempted to eliminate through the imposition of new fees on the sale of tuition
credits. Within weeks of Casey's audit, the State Treasurer announced that
TAP's actuarial deficit had doubled to $52 million and she would re-instate premiums
of up to 9 percent on the purchase of TAP credits.
• Bob Casey exposed the fact that the Ridge administration's Department
of Community and Economic Development grossly overstated export sales and new
jobs attributed to its foreign trade missions and international trade offices. In fact, the administration's claims about increased export sales and
new jobs in Pennsylvania as a result of international trade activities were completely
unsupported.
• He conducted a performance audit that found the Department of Public
Welfare did not have accurate records to document more than $8 billion it
spent on medical care for low-income families enrolled in the
HealthChoices managed care program.
• He exposed the Department of Education's shocking disregard for sound
business practices in its award of a $2.7 million, no-bid contract to
Edison Schools, Inc. to analyze the Philadelphia School District.
• He conducted a performance audit of the state's Community
Revitalization Program which found that the program was not
competitive and that no criteria were used in awarding millions of
tax dollars to legislators' pet projects.
• He offered several recommendations to improve accountability at the Port
Authority of Allegheny County after his audit found that the Authority
wasted $561,000 when it awarded and then terminated a $4 million contract with
a California company to implement and maintain an automated work
order system for bus maintenance. The Authority decided it could do the
work itself. Casey's audit also exposed unnecessary waste, lax oversight
and lost equipment at the Authority.
"Mr. Casey's advocacy for Pennsylvanians of all ages is
admirable."
Allentown Morning Call, October 23, 2000
• Bob Casey conducted a performance audit that found that the Board of
Probation and Parole lost track of nearly 1,600 paroled prisoners under its
supervision; imposed meaningless sanctions on violent offenders;
and failed to meet its own supervisory requirements in 90 percent of the cases
sampled.
• He created the Commonwealth's first-ever Minority and Women Business
Enterprise (MBE/WBE) Task Force to promote legislative and policy
reforms to expand access to state government contracting opportunities.
• Bob Casey created this MBE/WBE Task Force after a performance audit
he conducted found that the Commonwealth was doing little or nothing to help
minority- and women-owned businesses secure state contracting work
for which they were qualified. Out of $5.8 billion in state contracts
awarded during a two-year period, Casey found that only 4 percent went
to minority- and women-owned firms. As part of his audit, Casey
offered over 40 recommendations to help level the playing field and improve
state oversight of the MBE/WBE Program.
• Bob Casey's audit and the work of his MBE/WBE Task Force laid the
foundation for Governor Rendell's ongoing reforms to the Commonwealth's MBE/WBE
program. The Governor was so impressed that he hired one of
Casey's top deputies to implement the changes and appointed Casey to his Ad Hoc
Advisory Committee on Minority- and Women-Owned Business Opportunities.
• Bob Casey helped Governor Rendell improve the state's workforce
development system after his performance audit found that hundreds of
millions of dollars in workforce development spending had failed to provide
Pennsylvania workers with the education, training and skills they needed
to meet employers' demands.
• He urged Governor Ridge to reverse policies that adversely impact
working parents struggling to break the cycle of welfare dependency,
including those that exclude education and training from the work requirement,
sanction children as well as parents, and place women and children at risk of
further domestic violence.
• He served as a member of the Advisory Committee of the Joint State
Government Commission Task Force on Services to Children and Youth
which developed recommendations to better meet the needs of children who
are victims of abuse.
• Bob Casey led - and won - the fight to provide for greater public
disclosure of the identity and whereabouts of convicted sexual offenders
after a performance audit he conducted exposed the startling inadequacies of
Pennsylvania's Megan's Law. Casey's audit also revealed that the
Pennsylvania State Police lost track of hundreds of convicted sex offenders and
sometimes failed to notify communities that sexually violent predators had
moved into their neighborhoods. As a result of Casey's advocacy, dramatic changes were made. The
public now has access to information about more than 7,500 sex offenders, not just
the 17 that were available on the State Police web site at the time of Casey's audit.
• Bob Casey was a leader in the battle to convince the Pennsylvania House
to pass legislation to better protect children who are victimized by crime
when they testify at trials. After a long fight, voters in
2003 approved a constitutional amendment to allow child victims to testify by
videotape or closed-circuit TV.
• Bob Casey conducted an investigation following the tragic death of a
four-year-old that found deficiencies in the Child Protective Services Law
(CPSL) and in the handling of child abuse complaints. To
better protect Pennsylvania's children, Casey recommended that the General
Assembly amend the CPSL to clarify child abuse complaint categories, lengthen
the timetable for retention of abuse reports, and allow the Auditor General
access to child abuse report files.
• Bob Casey conducted the first-ever performance audit of the
Department of Environmental Protection's oversight of Pennsylvania mammography
facilities. He found that DEP inspected nearly all of these
facilities on time and in compliance with stringent federal quality and safety
standards. As a result of Casey's audit - and at his urging - DEP
improved women's access to DEP inspection information.
• He urged the Ridge administration to amend PA's Medicaid plan to
accept federal funding to treat uninsured, low-income women with breast and
cervical cancers, and he repeatedly urged the Ridge administration to prepare a mapping
breakdown of breast cancer rates across the Commonwealth of
Pennsylvania.
• Bob Casey conducted a performance audit of the Commonwealth's oversight
of group homes for the mentally retarded in Western Pennsylvania that
found serious deficiencies that threaten the health and safety of residents,
including allegations of abuse and unexpected deaths that were not investigated
promptly, caregivers with criminal backgrounds, and inadequately trained
caregivers. He offered nearly 50 recommendations to improve quality
of care.
"He has a proven track record of standing up for seniors."
Wilkes-Barre Citizens' Voice, May 20, 2002
• Bob Casey's first-ever performance audit of Pennsylvania's
long-term care system found that Health Department bureaucrats were letting weeks and months elapse before investigating life-threatening complaints about
nursing home care. In one case, the Health Department showed
up to investigate a complaint 10 days after the resident had died. As
a result of Casey's audit and the 25 recommendations he offered to improve the
quality of long-term care, Governor Ridge was forced to acknowledge the
flaws in the nursing home complaint response system, increase the Health
Department's budget by $1.4 million, institute sweeping changes in Health's
policies and procedures, and accept the Health Secretary's resignation.
• Bob Casey successfully challenged the Governor to compile a omprehensive,
family-friendly, easy-to-access Nursing Home Report Card, crack
down on bad nursing homes, and initiate surprise inspections of nursing homes.
• Eight months after exposing the state's failure to effectively monitor
the health and safety of nursing home residents, and after personally visiting
several nursing homes, Bob Casey presented Governor Ridge with a detailed
action plan to improve the quality of long-term care. The
recommendations of Casey's Task Force included:
-
Strengthening whistleblower protections for nursing home employees who expose
fraud that results in substandard care;
- Improving the Health Department's enforcement of laws and imposition of
sanctions;
-
Addressing the staffing crisis among nursing assistants;
-
Providing cost-effective public funding for assisted living; and
-
Opposing privatization of county-owned nursing homes.
• He increased awareness of whistleblower protections currently
available for nursing home employees and others under the Older
Americans Protective Services Act by providing every Pennsylvania nursing home
with a notice they could post.
• He conducted an audit which found that the state paid a county
nursing home nearly $6,500 in Medicaid funds for residents who were discharged
or dead.
• Bob Casey focused unprecedented attention on Pennsylvania's
long-term care staffing crisis. In 1999, he coordinated the state's
first-ever long-term care symposium to address the critical shortage of
qualified nurses' aides and develop new ways to recruit and retain more direct
care staff. He repeatedly spoke out against
mandatory overtime for nurses' aides, deplorable pay, unsafe patient-staff
ratios, inadequate training and a lack of career advancement opportunities.
• In 2003, Bob Casey and the Pennsylvania Culture Change Coalition,
a group he helped form following his 1999 symposium, presented Governor Rendell
with a comprehensive strategy to address Pennsylvania's long-term care
staffing crisis.
• He conducted the first-ever performance audit of home health care
oversight which found that the administration failed to impose sanctions on
home health care agencies that had been cited for serious deficiencies. State officials agreed with Casey's
findings and recommendations and pledged to develop a strategy to more
effectively use sanctions to improve the quality of home health care.
• He conducted the first-ever performance audit of the state's
oversight of personal care homes which found that DPW renewed
licenses without verifying that serious violations were corrected, licensed new
homes without ensuring that administrators and staff were qualified, failed to
impose fines and penalties as required by law, and investigated almost half of
the complaints it received late.
•. He exposed the Ridge administration's lax oversight of hospitals
and warned that serious health and safety violations may go undetected for
years, threatening patients.
• He worked with the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Middle District of Pennsylvania to share information about nursing home complaints, deficiencies and improprieties.
"Mr. Casey provides a badly needed watchdog service on the
cost-effectiveness of providing health and child care for poor children."
Philadelphia Inquirer, November 13, 1998
• Bob Casey prompted the Department of Public Welfare to change many
of its policies after his first-ever performance audit of the
state's child care oversight found serious deficiencies,
including unreported child abuse, late investigations of "high-risk"
complaints, and child care centers operating with expired licenses. Child
abuse allegations are now immediately referred to the proper authorities for
investigation.
• He successfully pushed Governor Ridge to mandate criminal background
checks for child care providers who receive state funds after his
auditors found 25 people with serious criminal backgrounds - including
manslaughter and statutory rape - caring for children in their homes at
taxpayer expense.
• He conducted a performance audit that uncovered a $400 million
stockpile of child care and other funds at the same time the
Ridge administration was dramatically increasing the co-payments that
low-income working mothers paid for child care.
• He forced the Ridge administration to reverse its cruel and unfair
child care regulations that were decimating the budgets of low-income working
families and putting children at risk. After a year of
pressure - during which Casey joined struggling working moms at 13 public
forums across the state and distributed to the Governor two compendiums of
real-life testimony from these forums - Governor Ridge finally announced
that he would make subsidized child care more affordable.
• For his tireless advocacy on behalf of children in child care, Bob Casey
received the Beacon Award from the Pennsylvania Child Care Association.
• He conducted a performance audit which found that the Commonwealth forfeited
over $100 million in state and federal funds for the Children's Health
Insurance Program when there were as many as 50,000 children
eligible, but not enrolled.
• He repeatedly urged the Governor and General Assembly to improve the
Medicaid and Children's Health Insurance Programs by doing such
things as covering all uninsured children up to age 19, implementing aggressive
outreach efforts to enroll more kids, and expanding coverage to encourage
immunizations.
"One thing is clear: Casey has put his finger on the pulse of
Pennsylvania taxpayers: public education, its quality and cost."
Bloomsburg Press-Enterprise, January 14, 1998
• Bob Casey repeatedly advocated public policies that help
young children reach school age healthy and ready to learn. In June
2001, he opened a national conference at Harvard's John F. Kennedy School
of Government that highlighted innovations in child care and early childhood
education programs.
• Several school districts implemented new safeguards to better
protect children after audits by Bob Casey exposed bus drivers
with criminal histories, bus drivers who lacked child abuse clearances, and bus
drivers who lacked valid drivers' licenses. In 2006, legislation was finally passed that required all prospective school employees - including bus drivers - to submit a copy of their federal criminal history record with their employment application.
• He repeatedly urged the Governor to make investments in education
to reduce class size, improve teacher training, and retain
well-qualified teachers.
• He launched Pennsylvania's first-ever School District Performance
Review Program to improve efficiency and help get more dollars into the
classroom for teaching and learning. These voluntary
reviews offered hundreds of recommendations and identified millions in
potential savings for 18 school districts.
• He conducted a special audit of 40 school districts that found numerous
instances of non-compliance with a state law relating to violence and
weapons in schools.
• He audited over two dozen charter schools, finding that
many of them did not require most of their professional staffs to hold
appropriate state certification.
• He recommended several ways that state government and school districts
can better safeguard school district investments, prepared a
report for school districts to help them avoid losing funds to risky investment
schemes, and helped draft legislation to better protect the investments of
school districts and municipal governments.
• He notified school districts that they may not be receiving all the
local taxes they are owed after investigators uncovered questionable practices
at two tax collection firms.
• He conducted several investigations of school districts, including one that led to a conviction and prison term for a superintendent who illegally used school district funds to purchase Japanese artifacts.
"Casey's emphasis on the concerns of real people is the strongest
recommendation for him. He conveys the character of deep Pennsylvania
roots."