Ohio Department of Job and Family Services Director Tom Hayes today announced the department has taken steps to address a significant portion of the findings identified in a performance audit released by Auditor of State Jim Petro.

"Corrective action has either been completed or is in progress involving 90 of the audit's 98 findings," Hayes said. "We didn't want to wait until this audit was released to get started. As issues were identified by the auditor's staff, or by our staff, we took immediate action."

The department has taken action to fully address 37 of the audit findings. Steps are in progress to address an additional 53 audit findings.

"We have made substantial progress since the audit was first requested 16 months ago," Hayes said. "We will continue to measure our progress against the findings of this report as we work to improve the overall performance of Ohio's child support program."

Since the audit was requested the federal government has conditionally certified the Support Enforcement Tracking System as being in compliance with requirements of the Family Support Act of 1988 resulting in the return to the state of nearly $26 million in previously paid penalties. The federal government is currently evaluating SETS for compliance with 1996 federal welfare legislation. Meanwhile, technical support for two child support projects, the Support Enforcement Tracking System and the central collection and disbursement bank account, is currently being secured through the competitive bid process. The award of the SETS contract is to be announced in the next few weeks while award of the central bank account contract is anticipated by September.

There are about 985,000 child support cases in Ohio. Total collections were $1.82 billion in State Fiscal Year 2001. Ohio has the sixth largest child support caseload in the nation but ranks second in the nation in total collections and first nationally in collections for non-public assistance cases. More than 99.3 percent of collections are posted within two business days. The program is cost effective, collecting $4.82 for every dollar spent, better than the national average of $4.21.

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