Who Is Watching the Watchdog? Measure S and the Oversight Question

Imagine hiring someone to manage your business finances. That manager then chooses every member of the committee responsible for watching how the money is spent. The committee can inspect the records and recommend changes, but the manager is not required to follow its recommendations.

Would you consider that independent oversight?

Fresno County voters should ask that question about Measure S, the proposed 30-year extension of the county’s half-cent transportation sales tax. Supporters point to an 11-member Citizens Oversight Committee, annual independent audits and public reporting. Those safeguards are written into the measure. We should examine what they allow the public to do.

Under Measure S, the Fresno Council of Governments, known as Fresno COG, would administer the transportation program. Fresno COG’s policy board would also select all 11 members of the Citizens Oversight Committee.

The measure places restrictions on who may serve. Committee members cannot hold elected office, work for certain agencies receiving funds or have a financial interest in a Fresno COG-funded project. These are sensible protections. But every member would still be chosen by the governing board of the agency the committee is supposed to oversee.

What authority would those members have once appointed? They could review financial and performance audits, examine whether expenditures comply with the measure, publish annual findings, make recommendations and refer suspected misuse to prosecutors. They could bring problems into public view. The measure does not give them authority to stop an expenditure, change a project decision or require Fresno COG to adopt a recommendation.

That distinction matters. A watchdog needs to do more than identify a problem. The public needs to know what happens after it sounds the alarm.

To be fair, Measure S includes enforcement provisions. Agencies receiving funds must submit annual independent audits. If an agency is found out of compliance, its funding may be withheld until it makes appropriate reimbursements and achieves compliance. Fresno COG must also conduct an independent audit of measure revenues and expenditures.

Those audits can help answer whether money was spent according to the rules. Taxpayers need another answer as well: Did the spending deliver what was promised?

A transportation project can fit an approved spending category and still arrive years late. It can cost more than expected or fail to address the street residents need repaired most. An audit may find that every dollar was properly accounted for while drivers continue to hit the same potholes and families continue to walk along broken sidewalks.

Consider a small business owner whose customers must navigate a damaged street to reach the front door. A report showing that transportation funds were spent legally is useful. That owner also deserves to know when the street will be repaired, what the project will cost and who must explain a missed deadline.

Oversight should connect spending to results. Residents should be able to see a project’s original budget, current cost, promised completion date and actual progress. When a project falls behind, officials should explain why. When an oversight committee raises a serious concern, the agency should respond publicly and explain what it will do.

Would Measure S require Fresno COG to give that kind of response to the committee’s recommendations? Voters should look closely at that question. Public findings have far more value when decision makers must address them on the record.

The measure calls for committee meetings at least quarterly, annual public findings and a comprehensive review at least every ten years. Those opportunities to examine the program are useful. Yet ten years is a long time to discover that a spending strategy has fallen short. Residents will need clear information and timely answers throughout the life of a 30-year tax.

The people appointed to the committee may be diligent, independent minded residents. My concern is with the structure around them. If Fresno COG chooses every member and retains the final say over decisions, the public should understand the limits of the committee’s authority before calling it independent oversight.

Before making a 30-year commitment, we should ask: Why does the board administering Measure S select every member of its citizens watchdog? What must Fresno COG do when that committee identifies a problem? Will residents be able to compare promised projects with completed work, costs and deadlines? And if the spending follows the rules but our streets do not improve as promised, who will be held accountable?