Mississippi

State agencies and subrecipients of federal awards are required to retain all records pertaining to the federal award for a specific period.  MCCB incorrectly stated when the records retention period begins in both the RFP and the Program Guidelines for the PY2020 grant competition.  The grant application materials stated that the three-year records retention begins on the first day of the next fiscal year.  However, the federal records retention requirement is from the date of submission of the final expenditure report or the quarterly or annual financial report, as appropriate.  MCCB must revise the records retention policy guidance for subrecipients to correctly state the Uniform Guidance requirement.

States are required to allow local providers to charge indirect costs as part of administrative costs.  AEFLA is a program where federal funding is intended to "supplement and not supplant" other State or local funding; therefore, local providers must use a negotiated restricted indirect cost rate if they choose to charge indirect costs. 

MCCB incorrectly set indirect costs at 5% for all subrecipients, which does not comply with the Uniform Guidance or EDGAR.  Specifically, in the grant award notification terms and conditions MCCB states, “The negotiated indirect cost rate of no more than 5% is approved for the entity and applies to this grant award.”  This is a standard rather than specific term of the award and applies to all subrecipients.  The Program Guidelines states, “Indirect costs are allowable to be charged to the grant at a rate up to 5% of Salaries and Fringe Benefits.”

MCCB must revise and issue policy guidance to inform local providers about the allowability of charging indirect costs, using a restricted rate.

State agencies are required to include specific information in the grant award notifications issued to AEFLA subrecipients.  MCCB provided each AEFLA subrecipient with a letter of an award notification and the contract, which included the terms and conditions of receiving federal funds.  However, MCCB did not include all elements required by the Uniform Guidance.  Specifically, the AEFLA award letter and contract did not include State and federal funding amounts separately, the subrecipient’s unique identifier, the federal award date, the State’s indirect cost rate, and the local provider’s indirect cost rate, if appropriate.

MCCB must issue corrected subaward documents to all subrecipients no later than the end of the current continuation award period. 

WIOA requires that whenever a State adds a requirement based on a State rule or policy that is not imposed under federal law or regulation, it must identify the rule or policy as being imposed by the State. 

For the PY 2020 competition, MCCB included several State-specific requirements in the grant application materials and identified them as such.  However, there were instances in which MCCB did not correctly apply the requirement.  In the State’s definition of English Language Acquisition (ELA) Program, there is a requirement that all of the ELA programs must include Civics Education.  That should be identified as a state-imposed requirement but was not.  In addition, there were requirements that were misidentified as State-imposed requirements, such as addressing the General Education Provisions Act (GEPA) section 427, the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA), and responsiveness to monitoring, all of which are federal requirements. 

MCCB must revise its application materials to clearly and consistently identify State-imposed requirements that are based on the State’s rules or policies.

 For the purposes of AEFLA implementation, concurrent or co-enrollment refers to enrollment by an eligible individual in two or more of the six core programs administered under WIOA.  The term is used in AEFLA to denote requirements related to eligible provider application requirements, use of AEFLA funds, and performance reporting. 

In its Program Guidelines, MCCB included a definition of concurrent enrollment that was not consistent with its regulatory definition.  MCCB Program Guidelines define concurrent enrollment as, “Enrollment in adult education and credit-bearing academic postsecondary education.”  While this definition is commonly used in other educational contexts, the term, as it is applied throughout the MCCB guidelines, is specific to AEFLA implementation and requires it to be defined consistent with the regulatory definition.

AEFLA requires eligible providers to include in their applications information and assurances that describe how they will fulfill their one-stop partner responsibilities, which include: providing access to adult education and literacy through the one-stop delivery system; using funds available under WIOA to maintain the one-stop delivery system; entering into memoranda of understanding (MOUs) for operating one-stops with local workforce boards; participating in the operations of the one-stops, consistent with the MOUs; and providing representation to the State board.

MCCB did not include in its application materials a requirement for applicants to provide this information in their applications.  While MCCB excelled in describing local providers’ alignment with workforce boards’ development plans, it did not include the five required activities for operating the one-stops.  In discussions with the State staff, the review team determined that four community colleges have been delegated the one-stop roles and responsibilities from the state eligible agency.  Hinds Community College (HCC) is one of the four local providers with the title II responsibility.  HCC’s application was submitted by MCCB for the monitoring review.  While HCC includes a description of the wrap around services provided in the one-stop and its role in those, it did not provide a description of how it would address all of the five responsibilities delegated to it.  Specifically, HCC did not describe how it would pay infrastructure costs or participate in a Memorandum of Understanding with one-stop partners.  Furthermore, the HCC budget did not have a line item for infrastructure costs.  HCC also did not discuss how it provides representation to the State board.   

MCCB must ensure that local providers with delegated responsibilities for the one-stop include the description of how they plan to address all five responsibilities in their applications.