October 12, 2026
A home under construction in Providence's Silver Lake neighborhood in May 2026. (Photo by Christopher Shea/Rhode Island Current)
Two years after federal monitors found numerous problems with how grant money was tracked and spent by state housing officials, a new audit echoes many of those same problems.
The 25-page report published Sept. 29 by the state’s Office of Internal Audit and Program Integrity found that the Rhode Island Executive Office of Housing (EOH) failed to record nearly $2.8 million in federal funds and left more than $200,000 in grant money undrawn after the grants expired. Auditors attributed the problems to a lack of clear procedures for tracking grants and monitoring the organizations that received the money.
“The absence of formalized procedures and standardized templates has resulted in a lack of clarity and uniformity in grant management practices, contributing to inconsistent implementation and incomplete compliance with federal and state requirements,” Andrew Manca, the state’s chief of internal audits, wrote in the report.
Housing officials say they have begun addressing the problems, though some changes were still awaiting formal adoption by the time the audit was completed.
“Several corrective actions have already been implemented, and the remaining items are progressing toward completion,“ Emily Marshall, spokesperson for the Executive Office of Housing, wrote in an email to Rhode Island Current.
Housing officials set an Oct. 31 deadline to address the remaining issues, according to the audit.
The state’s audit examined the Executive Office of Housing’s management of about $54.2 million in federal and state grants from July through December 2025.
As part of the review, auditors looked closely into four federal grants that expired between 2022 and 2025. They found $202,710 in funds were not drawn because organizations receiving the grants did not submit eligible expenses. As of June 2026, the state’s grant management system had not been updated to reflect the status of those funds.
The report notes housing officials said they had asked the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) to extend those grants, but could not provide auditors with documentation of the requests.
Marshall said that HUD’s Boston regional office approved extensions for the affected grants on Oct. 1, allowing the projects to continue.
She added that the office mandated quarterly reviews of all federal grants for fiscal year 2027, which began July 1, 2026. Program and financial staff will review how much has been spent, how much money has been received and how much remains available.
Auditors also found the housing office failed to consistently record federal grant deposits in the state’s accounting system, as is required upon receiving the funds.
Unrecorded funds do not represent money lost by the state, as any federal deposits that remain unrecorded at the end of the fiscal year are transferred to a state escrow account. But Manca wrote the failure to record them increased the risk of inaccurate financial reporting.
Marshall attributed the delays to the state’s transition from its old accounting system to a new enterprise resource planning system. She said housing officials addressed the discrepancies by June 30, 2026, with remaining amounts recorded in July.
The state audit comes after HUD in 2024 flagged weaknesses in Rhode Island’s oversight of federal housing grants. That analysis found Rhode Island housing officials failed to keep adequate records of how some COVID-era grant money was spent, track who benefited from the funds and ensure the money wasn’t duplicating other assistance.
The HUD review covered funds received between 2021 and 2023, mostly before the housing office became a standalone agency.
“After this came out in 2024, our office reviewed the findings and concerns and were in communication with HUD about how we understood the work to have been in compliance or have addressed and resolved them,” Marshall said.
Rep. June Speakman, a Warren Democrat who chairs the House Commission on Housing Affordability, said she was concerned about the housing office’s tracking of grant money but couldn’t tell from the state’s audit whether the accounting problems stemmed from agency shortcomings or the transition to a new state financial system.
Speakman also pointed to leadership turnover and staffing challenges at the housing office, which became a standalone agency in 2023 after bouncing from the Rhode Island Commerce Corporation to the Department of Administration.
“I would not be surprised if it took it a minute to get some systems in place to make sure that they were complying with all the federal rights and all the auditor’s requirements,” Speakman said.
The agency, originally established as the Department of Housing, was renamed the Executive Office of Housing in 2025 under Secretary Deborah Goddard as part of an effort to consolidate state housing oversight.
Speakman said Goddard has brought more staff on board than the office had under its two previous leaders. The housing office had 17 employees in early 2023 and 26 by May 2024. Marshall confirmed that the agency now has 31 employees.
Still, Speakman cautioned that she could not independently assess the agency’s performance. Based on the office’s responses to the audit, she said, it appeared officials were addressing the concerns.
“It seems to me that they’re on it,” she said.
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Courtesy of Rhode Island Current
