Anchorage let $11.8 million skip the books it promised to check

Anchorage had the authority to scrutinize a category of off-the-books spending starting in January 2024. It waited until December 2025 to start. In the meantime, at least $11.8 million moved through that channel, none of it appearing on the city's public spending tracker.

That is the finding of a new internal audit. The money went out as non-PO payments, invoices paid without a purchase order and outside the competitive bidding some of them should have triggered. Auditors counted about $5.85 million in 2024, $5.37 million in 2025, and another $620,000 in early 2026.

Not all of it broke the rules, but some did. Departments bought goods and services above the thresholds that require competitive solicitation and routed the invoices around the requirement anyway, including equipment rentals that ran on after the contract expired and a sole-source payment made before it was approved.

The Purchasing Department was cleared to review these payments in January 2024 and didn't begin for nearly two years. Even once it did, at least 343 invoices worth about $795,000 still went out as non-PO despite needing a purchase order. None of it surfaced on the city's mandated Online Checkbook, the tool meant to let the public track where money goes.

Management agreed with the findings and noted that current Purchasing staff flagged the problem and asked for the audit. Fixes are targeted for 2027. The report goes to the Assembly on Aug. 4.