Audit finds failures inside Navajo veterans agency
WINDOW ROCK
Four years after auditors documented 23 problems inside the Navajo Nation Veterans Administration, the 25th Navajo Nation Council is weighing whether to formally accept the report and approve a corrective action plan.
The findings range from missing housing records and payments made to ineligible people to a donated vehicle auditors said was used for the wrong purpose.
Legislation 0095-26, sponsored by Delegate Germaine Simonson, would accept Audit Report No. 22-06, released by the Office of the Auditor General in April 2022 and covering fiscal 2016 through 2020. The bill would also approve a corrective action plan signed by former NNVA Executive Director James Zwierlein.
The Health, Education and Human Services Committee tabled the legislation May 18 on a 3-2 vote. The measure now heads to the Budget and Finance Committee, which has final say. No hearing date has been set.
Phoenix-based audit firm HeinfeldMeech & Co. conducted the audit under contract with the Office of the Auditor General. Auditors interviewed staff at NNVA headquarters in Window Rock and agency offices in Chinle, Crownpoint, Fort Defiance, Shiprock and Tuba City. They reviewed financial assistance payments, observed housing committee meetings and built a Python program to test compliance with payment rules.
The first four findings focused on the Veterans Housing Program, which auditors said was largely inactive during the review period. NNVA stopped accepting new housing applications in August 2019 while trying to address deficiencies identified in a separate 2017 REDW LLC internal audit.
Audit Finding 2 reported that management failed to regularly review housing program finances, citing pension-related journal entries posted during years when the program reported no salary expenses. Current managers could not explain the entries.
To read the full article, please see the May 28, 2026, edition of the Navajo Times.
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