A new audit of the Indianapolis Office of Public Health and Safety identifies six high-risk and two moderate-risk findings, painting a picture of an agency whose budget grew 75% over five years without the policies, training, or controls to manage it.
The Office of Audit and Performance review, dated April 9, covers OPHS activity from 2020 through 2025 and tested 29 vendor contracts representing roughly $40.3 million of the $43.9 million OPHS spent on programmatic vendors during that window. Auditors found that 84% of contracts had missing, incomplete, or noncompliant invoice documentation, and 51% lacked sufficient programmatic documentation to show what services vendors actually delivered.
The most pointed finding involves conflicts of interest. Several contracts were awarded to vendors with “significant connections” to current OPHS employees, including one vendor who was employed by OPHS during the contract period. Those connections were not disclosed, and auditors found no documentation that the OPHS employees in question were walled off from the selection process or that any ethics exceptions had been properly approved by the Office of Corporation Counsel.
In its written response, OPHS noted that the family connections involved adult, non-dependent children — meaning they fall outside the City Code’s definition of “immediate family.” The agency nonetheless committed to new ethics training and a revamped Program and Project Design SOP.
The audit’s observations section flags a separate $75,000 grant awarded in November 2024 to a private school’s tuition-free summer program for underserved youth, filed under the Violence Reduction division but with a budget heavy on grant writing, strategic planning, and professional development consultants. The grant began under a former OPHS director who now sits on the executive leadership of the program’s partner organization, creating what auditors called “a perceived conflict of interest that could cause reputational harm to the office.”
Mirror Indy reported that the program is the Horizons program at Richards Episcopal School, and that former OPHS Director Martine Romy Bernard-Tucker confirmed she believes she is the official referenced. Bernard-Tucker told Mirror Indy she consulted OPHS legal counsel before the contract was awarded, serves on the Horizons board as an unpaid volunteer, and that her children — who attend Richards — are not eligible for the program.
Auditors also faulted OPHS for using the Greater Indianapolis Progress Committee as the recipient of an $800,000 USDA Local Food Purchase Assistance grant despite the grant not requiring a 501(c)(3) applicant. Per the management response, community advocates and the OPHS Division of Community Nutrition and Food Policy “agreed to allow the funds to operate through the OPHS/GIPC food account without OPHS leadership knowledge.”
A separate finding documents $314,119 in City general funds transferred from the Mayor’s Office and OPHS to a GIPC account between January 2021 and January 2023, a maneuver the audit says allowed the money to “circumvent both City Purchasing and the County Auditor’s office review and approval.” The transfers were authorized by a December 2021 memo from the Mayor’s Office. A remaining balance of $8,162.66 was returned to the General Fund in April 2025 at the request of current OPHS Director Andrew Merkley.
Merkley, appointed by Mayor Joe Hogsett in March 2025, told staff in an April 23 email obtained by Mirror Indy that the audit “does not tell the full story” of the agency. The agency’s management responses across all eight findings commit to full implementation of new SOPs, training, and controls in fiscal year 2026.
The Marion County Republican Party has called for a funding freeze. City-County Councilor Michael-Paul Hart, R-District 20, told WFYI he wants improved operations before any additional programmatic dollars are appropriated.
