From: Sent: To: Subject: Attachments: Armijo, Sadie (SAO) Wednesday, November 18, 2020 4:27 PM Leider, Mary (SAO) FW: Ensuring a smooth working relationship SAO Audit Protocols-v.2.pdf From: LeVine, Suzi (ESD) Sent: Friday, October 16, 2020 4:55 PM To: Armijo, Sadie (SAO) Cc: Frank, Scott (SAO) ; Tinney, Brian (OFM) ; Hainline, Benjamin (ESD) ; Wicker, Kelly (GOV) ; Feek, Cami (ESD) Subject: Ensuring a smooth working relationship Good afternoon Sadie, Earlier today, I learned of an ongoing issue regarding adherence to the audit protocols that our agencies collectively agreed upon at the onset of the many audits your office is conducting at ESD (see attached). Within that, the protocols direct that all audit requests go through our Office of Internal Audit to help coordinate and facilitate external audits and they also provide for inclusion of our audit liaison in meetings with SAO and our staff. This is common practice, and, in fact, in line with many agencies that have similar protocols that rely on agency audit liaisons to be present at meetings. Recently, you requested, through my Deputy, Cami Feek, and our Director of Internal Audit, Ben Hainline, the ability to grant exceptions to the protocol requiring our audit liaison attend meetings, on a case by case basis. The outcome of that conversation was that such requests would be considered if you have a business reason to do so, but not at your discretion. These protocols are not only important to ensure ESD has audit process consistency, but also allow us to maintain effective coordination, quality communication, and transparency. More importantly, these protocols prevent our own agency staff that are currently operating in a maximally stressful environment from being negatively impacted by the significant number of audits happening from multiple entities. The request made by Jim Brownell failed to provide any business need for us to consider. Therefore, I am not approving any override of our internal controls and I have directed our internal audit team to continue to adhere to and enforce the established audit protocols. I’ve shared publicly and I hope that my team has shared directly with you that I welcome the opportunity to learn from these audits, and to use the results to help our agency achieve its objectives and address related risks. We remain open and cooperative, and I am confident you see that these protocols are important to help both of us achieve this outcome. Respectfully, Suzi LeVine Commissioner, the Employment Security Department Please follow me @ESDCommish (pronouns: she/her/hers)