One of L.A.’s biggest homeless service providers has been awarded over $100 million in taxpayer funds while failing to comply with federal audit mandates, according to an LAist review of federal government records.

The downtown L.A.-based nonprofit Weingart Center is at the heart of a controversial property purchase under federal investigation and discussed in a recent criminal indictment of the developer who sold the property.

LAist found Weingart Center also has been continuously out of compliance with federal deadlines to turn in audits — known as “single audits” — since early 2022, based on a review of records in the federal database where they have to be uploaded.

The audits for fiscal years 2022 and 2023 were each finished a year and a half after the federal deadlines, according to the dates on those reviews. The audits show multiple failures by Weingart Center to properly account for taxpayer money that were not remedied from one year to the next.

The group still has not filed an audit that was due nine months ago for its fiscal year ending in April 2024, according to the federal database and L.A.’s regional homeless services agency.

Consequences for failing to turn in a single audit by the deadline can be significant. Federal agencies can cut off any further funds to groups that are overdue, and L.A.’s homeless services agency can do the same, according to a contract with Weingart Center.

Weingart Center has received over $100 million in taxpayer funds while it’s been out of compliance with turning in the audits, according to its latest public tax filing and an LAist review of the audits.

Among the funds the group received while out of compliance is a $9 million no-bid contract L.A. Mayor Karen Bass’ office directed officials to award Weingart Center in 2023 to run the largest shelter site in her signature homelessness program.

A Weingart Center audit also was overdue when the mayor and state officials greenlit the group’s taxpayer-funded purchase of a senior living facility in Cheviot Hills. Federal prosecutors earlier this month announced charges against the man who sold the property to Weingart Center.

Former state Sen. Kevin Murray, who has been Weingart Center’s president and CEO since 2011, has not returned LAist’s messages seeking comment.

Murray and Weingart Center’s chief of real estate development, Ben Rosen, have been placed on leave, according to the L.A. Times. Rosen also has not responded to LAist’s request for comment.

The nonprofit’s board has commissioned an outside investigation into the valuation of housing projects, Weingart Center spokesperson Stefan Friedman told LAist. He did not respond to questions about the audit failures.

Murray previously served in the state Legislature with Bass, who has not responded to a request for comment for this story.

Murray is an attorney and a licensed real estate broker. In addition to leading Weingart Center, he also has a local government role overseeing homelessness spending in the region.

Bass appointed him to the board that oversees hundreds of millions a year in government spending on housing and other programs from the Measure A tax approved by L.A. County voters last year.

The spending panel — known as LACAHSA — oversees just over a third of the roughly $1 billion expected to be generated each year from Measure A. Its job is to create new affordable homes, preserve existing lower-rent housing and prevent people from losing the housing they already have.

This September, Bass also nominated Rosen — the Weignart Center real estate chief — to the spending board as an alternative city appointee to step in when Murray can’t attend. She withdrew that nomination a few days after federal authorities announced their investigation into the property flip.

‘Disappointed’ it wasn’t caught sooner

A large share of the federal money Weingart Center received was distributed by the L.A. Homeless Services Authority, a joint city-county agency known as LAHSA.

LAHSA’s contract requirements say its vendors, like Weingart Center, have to comply with the single audit requirements in federal law. Those requirements say organizations that receive a certain amount of federal money — such as Weingart Center — have to submit the audits within nine months after their fiscal year ends.

Single audits are “the single most important way” to assess an organization’s ability to manage federal dollars, federal officials say.

Among other things, they check whether a group has an accounting system to accurately document the spending.

Weingart Center was long overdue turning in two annual audits for 2023 and 2024 to LAHSA when LAist contacted LAHSA on Oct. 23.

Weingart Center has since submitted its 2023 audit to LAHSA, but the 2024 audit remains overdue.

“We are currently evaluating options regarding next steps,” LAHSA spokesperson Ahmad Chapman told LAist on Nov. 20.

LAHSA’s new interim CEO, Gita O’Neill, told LAist she’s “disappointed” the homeless services authority didn’t catch Weingart Center’s late audits earlier and that she’s been working to beef up oversight of contractors.

O’Neill said LAHSA sent a notice of non-compliance to Weingart Center about the overdue audit and is reviewing the late-submitted audits to see “if additional action is needed.”

At the October meeting of LAHSA’s governing commission, O’Neill shared a plan to improve the agency’s oversight of contracts, which she told LAist will strengthen oversight over issues like single audits. O’Neill, who started at LAHSA in late August, said the reorganization plan would roll out publicly in a few weeks later.

“Every member of this reorganized team will receive training for their new role so we can more effectively hold our [service] providers to the standards we set for them,” O’Neill said. “This is an important step toward holding ourselves and our providers more accountable.”

What state officials say

Aside from LAHSA, the other major agency awarding federal dollars to Weingart Center is the state’s Department of Housing & Community Development, or HCD.

Records show HCD awarded tens of millions of dollars in federally funded grants to Weingart Center under the state’s Homekey program while the group has been out of compliance with turning in the audits.

In an emailed statement, a spokesperson for HCD said Weingart Center was not out of compliance with its award-granting process, which the agency called “very thorough.”

HCD’s agreement with Weingart Center for a 2024 grant says the nonprofit is responsible for complying with the single audit requirements.

The HCD spokesperson said the state housing agency is not responsible for reviewing the federal audits. Instead, the spokesperson said the audits are received and reviewed by the state controller’s office, which then identifies issues and discusses them with HCD.

The controller’s office told LAist it did not receive single audits from Weingart Center or any other nonprofit.

Problems found in latest available audit

The most recent available single audit of Weingart Center, covering fiscal year 2023, was not completed until July 2025, a year and a half after it was due.

That audit report, which LAist obtained from LAHSA, said Weingart Center followed the most important requirements for nonprofits receiving federal funds but also found a range of accounting failures.

The problems identified by auditors included:

The Weingart Shelby purchase

Weingart Center has been the focus of recent controversy over its use of $27 million in taxpayer funds to buy a senior housing complex from an investor who had just purchased it for less than half that price.

As Weingart Center’s leader, Murray signed key documents in the purchase of the property on Shelby Drive in Cheviot Hills, according to contract records produced by the city in response to LAist public records requests. The documents he signed include a purchase agreement in which he agreed to have Weingart Center keep the seller’s name confidential forever from the news media and general public, with narrow exceptions.

That purchase now is the focus of a federal investigation and was referenced in an October indictment of the man who sold the property to Weingart Center. It was funded by the state’s Homekey program and the city of L.A.

Murray previously told the L.A. Times he had “no prior relationship with the seller and no continuing relationship” and that taxpayers paid fair market price. He has not returned LAist’s messages seeking comment on the property deal.

LAist also has been investigating the sale of the Shelby property and found numerous discrepancies. They include an appraisal report Murray commissioned and submitted for taxpayer funding that showed false information about the purchase deal and the property’s ownership.

[Click here to read LAist’s article exploring the property flip, published today.]

Price concerns about another Murray-led project under same state grant program

The Shelby purchase is not the only Weingart Center property deal that has faced scrutiny.

This summer, city leaders in Torrance publicly alleged the group may have been massively overpaying for a hotel property under a new round of taxpayer-funded Homekey grants. For that site, Weingart Center had teamed up with L.A. County to apply for the grant.

It was one of several criticisms Torrance officials cited in urging the county not to proceed. Ultimately, the project was canceled.

Records show Murray had signed a purchase agreement for Weingart Center to buy the Torrance hotel for $30 million in taxpayer funds. An appraisal he later commissioned found its fair market value was close to the amount he agreed to.

But an appraisal commissioned by Torrance estimated it was worth just $10 million — a third of what Weingart had agreed to pay with taxpayer dollars.

Property valuations are being reviewed by the outside law firm hired by Weingart Center’s board, according to the nonprofit’s spokesperson.

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Officials at the county government’s housing agency, known as LACDA, say the appraisal Weingart Center submitted for the Torrance purchase “was conducted by a reputable appraisal company and did not raise concerns.”

Torrance officials, meanwhile, said they had “serious concerns” about how much taxpayers would be paying.

City leaders sent a letter urging the state to reject the grant application.

“This purchase price appears significantly inflated and represents a potential misuse of taxpayer dollars,” they wrote.