IG agrees with lawmakers on AmeriCorps mismanagement

Despite claims to the contrary by the chairman and members of a House subcommittee, Tuesday's AmeriCorps oversight hearing was a mostly partisan affair in which Republicans criticized federal management of President Clinton's pet program while Democrats defended it.

The only twist was that the inspector general for AmeriCorps' parent agency, the Corporation for National Service, was in accord with the GOP majority. Inspector General Luise Jordan said AmeriCorps had not succeeded in addressing any of nine "material weaknesses" identified by her office in audits over the past several years.

In a hearing titled "The Failed Promise of the Corporation for National Service," it was unsurprising to hear Education and the Workforce Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee Chairman Peter Hoekstra, R-Mich., complain about the "broken promises and broken commitments" of a program many Republicans have sought to abolish since the GOP took control of Congress in 1995.

Nor was it unusual to hear the panel's ranking member, Rep. Tim Roemer, D-Ind., say that isolated problems aside, the overall benefits of the program, which awards college tuition money to volunteers, are immeasurable.

What was unique was Roemer chastising Jordan, the IG, for her critical testimony, saying she was in essence blaming former Sen. Harris Wofford, D-Pa., now CEO of the Corporation for National Service, for mismanagement by state commissions.

Under the 1993 statute that created AmeriCorps, the Corporation for National Service, based in Washington, passes two-thirds of its funding through to state commissions that award grants to and monitor local programs.

"You're advocating more resources for oversight," Roemer said to Jordan. "Are you aware the House has zero-funded AmeriCorps?" He added that if anyone is responsible for oversight of the $714.5 million program, it is Congress, which devolved administration of AmeriCorps to the states. Congress may be responsible, shot back Rep. Charles Norwood, R-Ga., but so is the administration.

Robert Rogers, chairman of the board of the Corporation for National Service, had testified that AmeriCorps was in the process of implementing several changes to address concerns about financial management, including a new computer system that is Y2K compliant and a Web-based reporting system to provide "real-time" information about volunteers and hours logged.

Those are examples of progress that do not get talked about enough in the oversight hearings, a spokeswoman for the corporation said later.

She noted that the corporation was given a tall task when it had to integrate 30 years of financial records for programs such as VISTA that now come under AmeriCorps.

Rogers and subcommittee Democrats insisted that AmeriCorps programs that are grossly mismanaged, as was the case in Terre Haute, Ind.- are an anomaly and should be treated as such. Hoekstra essentially agreed, stating several times that thousands of young Americans have done good work through the program.

But he questioned the wisdom of Washington "running money through [state] organizations that aren't built up enough" to do the job, a reference to the state commissions that administer AmeriCorps grants.