DOJ to solve too little stimulus money for some police departments. Too much went to others.

Too little stimulus for some police departments

WASHINGTON — A popular government program that puts additional police officers on the street used a faulty formula that sent stimulus money to 45 police departments that shouldn’t have received the funds, says the Justice Department’s inspector general.

That meant 34 departments that should have gotten the money went without, the inspector general said.

In addition, six departments received more funds than they should have, and six others received less.

The inaccuracies in the formula affected the allocation of $16 million, Justice Department Inspector General Glenn Fine concluded in a report released this week.

The Office of Community Oriented Policing Services, or COPS, says it will modify its hiring grant process to make up the shortages next year to departments that were entitled to more.

The COPS office attributed the problem to an extremely high demand for grants, the development of a new online application system and “the dramatically compressed timeline to award COPS Hiring Recovery Program grants.”

The office evaluated, scored and awarded $1 billion in funds five months after economic stimulus legislation was signed into law on Feb. 19, 2009.

The initiative made 1,046 grants to hire or rehire 4,699 law enforcement officer positions.

Online: www.justice.gov/oig/reports/COPS/index.htm