Audit Objective
Determine whether Mechanicville City School District (District) officials appropriately tracked, inventoried and safeguarded information technology (IT) assets acquired or in use during the audit period.
Key Findings
District officials did not appropriately track or inventory IT assets, maintain complete IT inventory records or establish adequate controls to safeguard IT assets. As a result, officials cannot assure taxpayers that money invested in IT assets has been appropriately spent or safeguarded.
We selected 40 IT assets to confirm their location and that they were inventoried, and 15 additional IT assets to confirm they were inventoried. We found 36 percent of the sampled assets were not properly accounted for. Specifically:
- Four desktops ($535 each) and one television ($948) could not be located and were not inventoried.
- Five Chromebooks (estimated combined costs of $1,355 using recent purchase prices) could not be located but were inventoried.
- Ten IT assets, with combined purchase prices of approximately $7,300 were not inventoried.
In addition, annual inventories were not conducted and officials did not adopt a comprehensive written policy for IT equipment inventory.
Key Recommendations
- Ensure District inventory records are complete and include the details necessary to adequately track and locate IT assets.
- Perform annual and complete physical inventories and compare results to inventory records.
District officials generally agreed with our recommendations and have initiated or indicated they planned to initiate corrective action.