The Pandemic Response Accountability Committee (PRAC) launched its website and Twitter account today, and appointed Robert Westbrooks as Executive Director of the committee.
PRAC was created as a part of the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act and “is charged with coordinating oversight efforts of Federal Inspectors General (IG) to promote transparency of the $2.4 trillion in Federal emergency relief for individual citizens, businesses, hospitals, and industries impacted by the coronavirus pandemic.”
The PRAC website will provide the public with resources regarding Federal pandemic spending, such as:
- Federal funding allocations authorized by four emergency relief laws;
- Oversight reports from IGs overseeing agencies’ coronavirus responses;
- A listing of pandemic-related work by IGs;
- A hotline to submit allegations of fraud, waste, abuse, or whistleblower reprisal;
- A feedback form for the Federal response to the pandemic; and
- Pandemic-related press releases from U.S. Attorneys’ Offices, fraud awareness resources, and plans for pandemic-related fund use by agencies.
Westbrooks most recently served as IG for the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation to protect retirement benefits. He also served in leadership positions at the Small Business Administration Office of Inspector General (OIG), Department of Transportation OIG, U.S. Postal Service OIG, and National Archives and Records Administration OIG.
“I look forward to working with the entire oversight community – Federal, state, and local – to coordinate and conduct independent oversight over these critically important emergency relief programs, and help ensure that funds are used effectively and efficiently and major program risks are addressed,” Westbrooks said in a press release.
