DENVER — A new report by Denver auditor Timothy O’Brien accuses the Denver Police Department and Denver Department of Public Safety of failing to spend hundreds of thousands in grant money meant for a co-responder program.
O’Brien detailed his findings in a 48-page audit.
"One of the things that we look at is certain contracts and how the city complies with those contracts,” O’Brien said.
O’Brien said the Denver Police Department failed to live up to its agreement by not spending $383,000 in grant money that could have been used on mental health services, including the city's co-responder program.
In 2018, Denver voters approved a quarter-cent sales tax to fund mental health services, including the co-responder program, which pairs licensed mental health clinicians with officers to respond to calls involving people with mental health challenges.
O’Brien said the unused grant money accrued interest and now the city owes $438,000 to the Caring for Denver Foundation, the nonprofit that distributes the taxpayer dollars through grants.
The audit also accuses the city of making late payments to its service provider and using some of the grant money on things not allowed.
“There are things that the police department was spending money on that were not allowed in the grant,” O’Brien said. “I mean, they spent money on things like travel, which was specifically something that could not spend money on the grant.”
O’Brien said the city must do a better job of managing the grant money in the future.
"I think the findings provide the department a good foundation to go forward and make the program as good as it can possibly be,” he said.
The Denver Department of Public Safety, which includes the police department, says while they welcome oversight and agreed with most of the auditor's recommendations, the audit “lacked objectivity” and did not factor in things that “drastically impacted operations.”
“While we are appreciative of the Audit team’s insight into our practices, we were disappointed at the lack of context provided in the findings. The report did not factor in the environmental, societal or economic factors that directly impacted this program – including a global pandemic, civil unrest, and severe economic challenges that had major impacts on staffing and administrative capacity,” the department said in a statement. “It is important to note that there were no negative impacts to operational effectiveness and that the program met all intended goals despite the hardships faced during this time, which was not considered in this report,” a DDPS statement said.
O’Brien said the pandemic is no excuse.
“Administration of a grant is pretty much the same whether there's a pandemic or not,” O’Brien said.
The Department of Safety said the money it didn't spend has been returned to the Caring for Denver Foundation.
O’Brien says his report focused only on how the city managed the grant money. He said it did not investigate the effectiveness, benefits, or outcomes of the co-responder program itself.
To read the auditor’s report and the response from the Denver Department of Public Safety, click here.