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County auditor: most ViVi grantees met goals but reporting gaps and inconsistent metrics hinder oversight
Summary
The county auditor reviewed a sample of ViVi nonprofit grantees for FY2023–24, finding most met expectations yet noting late or incomplete reporting, inconsistent deliverable metrics across grantees, and opportunities for more monitoring, technical assistance and code alignment.
The county auditor presented a compliance review of the ViVi (grant-in-aid) program to the Communication Reports and Council Oversight Committee on May 20, summarizing findings from a sample of nonprofit grantees that receive Hawaii County funding.
Tyler Benner, county auditor, introduced the review and said it focused on grantee compliance with reporting requirements for fiscal year 2023–24. Jasmine Santos, the lead auditor for the review, told the committee the auditors examined a sample of 31 of the 69 participating nonprofit organizations (about 44.9% of organizations) and 33 of 75 funded programs. Those sampled programs accounted for $1,187,500 of the $2,497,500 appropriated (approximately 47.6% of the appropriation). Santos said two organizations included in the original population were later found ineligible and had not been awarded funding; that change was reflected in the scope calculation.
The report used a standardized rating system (a crosswalk on page 38 of the report) to categorize performance as exceeds expectations, meets expectations, or needs improvement. Auditors concluded most grantees met or exceeded contractual goals and delivered meaningful services, but they also identified late or incomplete reporting, insufficient documentation to verify some deliverables, and variability in how organizations defined outputs (for example, household counts versus meals versus individuals), which made comparison difficult.
The auditors recommended enhancing monitoring during the performance period, offering training and technical assistance to grantees, refining performance metrics and reporting templates, and improving the county’s grant oversight tools. Council members urged the auditor’s office to provide a higher-level summary of common errors (rather than organization-level findings for a selective sample) and to provide technical assistance to grantees. The auditor’s office said it would provide additional information offline and noted that the selective sample limited the fairness of direct organization-to-organization comparisons.
Council members discussed aligning the ViVi program more closely with federal standards and conducting a needs assessment before the next application cycle, so the program can better direct funds to county priorities. The committee also discussed grant management software and convening grantees before a system rollout to reduce friction.
The committee voted to close file on Communication 270. Councilmember Honeko Goro Inaba moved to close; Councilmember Kagiwada seconded; the committee recorded the communication as closed.
