EMA audit reveals oversight deficiencies of contractor payments
[August 19, 2026]
By Sean Reed | The Center Square
(The Center Square) – A recent audit of Illinois’ Emergency Management
Agency revealed oversight deficiencies of contracted employees and the
working hours the state was billed for them.
The audit found one company was paid roughly $78 million in taxpayer
funds to be on standby.
State Sen. Chapin Rose, R-Mahomet, chairs the Legislative Audit
Commission and put forward the resolution to audit the performance of
IEMA-OHS after issues with the agency’s previous director and assistant
director.
Rose explained the basis of the issues found within the audit.
“Rather than track the overtime hours and the hours and the time sheets
that were coming in from the contractors, they hired a contractor to
track those hours. They didn't track that contractor. And so none of it
was done properly,” Rose said.
Rose told The Center Square he thinks the audit’s findings are
consistent with other recent audits, all of which he said point to
mismanagement of executive state agencies.
“If you look under Governor Pritzker's eight years as governor, the
number of you know, the number of audit findings, the number of repeat
audit findings have all gone up. Which just leads to a general
conclusion that he is a terrible manager,” Rose said.
One key finding in the audit report Rose noted was the $435,000 salary
for a contracted employee serving as a temporary executive assistant to
the department’s director from November 2022 to October 2023.
Alicia Tate-Nadeau served as the agency’s director until her retirement
last year. The time period the audit was focused on was under her
leadership, but she left her role and Ted Berger has taken over.
“When this audit comes up – and this happens time and again – where
there's a problem, suddenly that director's gone and then they insert a
new director who comes in to try to clean up the agency,” Rose said.
“When the new director comes in, one of the first questions I have for
them is who was this person making $435,000 in a year to temporarily
replace an executive assistant?”
[to top of second column]
|
Illinois state Sen. Chapin Rose, R-Mahomet, during a news conference
in Springfield. Photo: Greg Bishop / The Center Square
Rose said not a single state agency or commission head makes as much
in a year as the contracted assistant did. In the most recent state
budget, no agency or commission head in Illinois made over $238,800.
IEMA-OHS’s Melissa Hahn, the deputy public information officer,
shared a statement noting that COVID-19 response was part of the
reason for the agency’s oversight issue of contractors.
“COVID-19 was an unprecedented disaster that required an
unprecedented response by the State and its agencies. IEMA-OHS takes
seriously the findings and recommendations of the Legislative Audit
Commission, as well as its own internal reviews of its disaster
response, and is in the process of reviewing the final report,” read
the statement.
Rose said COVID is a factor, but not the full reason for the audit
or its findings.
“Certainly some of those contractors, some of the contracts on the
stand-down hours were related to COVID, but this is inherently the
process when you have a governor who does not appoint effective
managers on the front end,” Rose said.
He said he has more questions about the audit’s details, which he
plans to have answered at the next commission hearing Sept. 9. |
