ST. PAUL, MN – Today, the Office of the Legislative Auditor (OLA) issued a report showing Minnesota IT Services (MNIT) has failed to properly oversee millions of taxpayer dollars in its Odyssey Investment Fund.
Following the report’s release, Rep. Jim Nash, R-Waconia, Vice Chair of the House State Government Finance Committee, issued the following statement:
“Today’s report shows a clear lack of process and procedures in managing Odyssey Fund projects, as well as a lack of transparency by MNIT in their required reporting to the legislature. We now see that the agency is mismanaging valuable taxpayer dollars, and the state has nothing to show for projects over a decade old that were never completed. I’m extremely disappointed in the findings, and call on MNIT Commissioner Clyborne and Governor Dayton to pledge to make agencies like MNIT more accountable and transparent to hardworking Minnesotans.”
The report found that, as of March 2018, the account’s balance was approximately $23 million, representing money transferred into the account but not yet used to pay project expenditures. It also found that $8 million transferred into the account for four projects did not have project requests and that 95 of the 209 projects approved between 2007 and 2017 had not been completed.
Nash plans to author legislation for the 2019 legislative session to address the report's findings and bring accountability to the use of taxpayer dollars.
The OLA’s full report can be found by clicking here.
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