Avula continues work on Richmond’s audit backlog, but several issues remain unfixed

RICHMOND, Va. (WRIC) -- Richmond Mayor Danny Avula continues to chip away at the city's backlog of overdue audit recommendations -- several of which he inherited upon taking office. However, many vital fixes are still waiting to be implemented.

Richmond's Office of the City Auditor (OCA) is responsible for holding the city's departments accountable for their actions. Whenever city auditors uncover a problem, the OCA issues a recommendation — or a solution that auditors believe would resolve said problem. Typically, these recommendations come with a due date.

Since taking office, Avula has put an emphasis on handling the city's overdue recommendations.

On Tuesday, March 17, Avula's office issued a report updating the public on the progress of this effort. Per the city, between Oct. 25, 2025 and Jan. 28, 23 open audit recommendations were either closed or "removed as no longer applicable," per a press release.

The majority of these resolved recommendations were marked as "high priority," meaning they were of significant importance.

Several were connected to employee purchasing cards. The city has been working to overhaul its p-card system for some time, seeking more accountability and transparency. Another four had to do with the Richmond Retirement System, which the OCA learned had paid out more than half a million dollars to deceased retirees.

Dozens of the recommendations Avula's office has resolved predate his administration. During this most recent audit period, seven of the resolved recommendations were issued before he took office.

“We see the auditor as an important partner in our continuous work to look for it, find it and fix it, and we are extremely grateful for the role his team plays in helping us modernize internal systems, strengthen oversight, and improve accountability,” Avula said in the release. “We have used recent audit findings to inform major transformation efforts and to prioritize initiatives in my proposed budget.”

Despite this progress, a total of 117 audit recommendations are still outstanding, with 108 past their original due date. Nearly 30 are related to the Department of Finance and another 15 are related to the Department of Public Utilities.

8News has reported on some of the audits related to these outstanding recommendations. In one such audit, the OCA found that Richmond had given $1 million to charitable organizations that did not meet its own criteria while denying $2.4 million to those that did.

In another case, city auditors found that Richmond's city warehouses were in disarray due to a lack of oversight, leaving the city open to fraud, waste and abuse.

Richmond officials are also still trying to create a plan to reconcile meals tax accounts following the city's meals tax fiasco, as well as how to handle the overpayments it made when trying to fix its tax rebate check fumble.

One outstanding audit recommendation initially issued in 2021 has to do with how to equitably enforce the city's delinquent real estate tax program. In Oct. 2025, 8News reported on how the city is owed more than $32 million in overdue real estate taxes, with some of the involved properties overgrown, infested and uninhabitable. Despite this, the city hasn't taken action to recoup these funds in years.