Outreach and Assistance for Socially Disadvantaged Farmers and Ranchers and Veteran Farmers and Ranchers Program (2501 Program) in Fiscal Years 2018 and 2019

Develop and implement controls to ensure grantees provide enough detail in their funds requests and expense justifications to allow OPPE to verify that USDA funds are used for their intended purpose and that project costs are necessary, reasonable, allowable, and allocable.

Establish controls to ensure grantee advanced monitoring activities are performed or if resources are not available, that alternative means to perform advanced monitoring activities are used.

Establish internal controls to verify that grantees submit OMB-approved performance progress reports, financial reports, and advance or reimbursement requests that are not expired and that contain the newer required certification language.

Establish and implement 2501 Program performance goals and performance indicators.

Inform grantees of the established performance goals and performance indicators from Recommendation 14 and require grantees to address these in their grantee performance progress reports.