Fort Lauderdale now finds itself under the scrutiny of the Florida Department of Government Efficiency, just as the city is bracing for possible passage of a ballot measure in November that would impose statewide property tax cuts.

Gov. Ron DeSantis created the Florida DOGE task force in February 2025 to identify and eliminate waste and fraud within local governments, state agencies and universities.

Fort Lauderdale received a four-page email from DOGE on Wednesday at 1:04 p.m. demanding the city turn over a long list of documents from fiscal year 2024 through 2026.

The city has until June 23 to turn over the documents. Financial penalties may accrue for an untimely response or failure to comply with the request, the email warns.

City Manager Rickelle Williams alerted the commission by email on Wednesday at 5:48 p.m.

“Our team will compile and submit the requested information on or before the June 23 deadline, with notification to the City Commission,” Williams wrote.

Commissioner Steve Glassman told the South Florida Sun Sentinel he welcomes the scrutiny but was surprised by the request.

Glassman pointed to the fact that the chief auditor for Florida DOGE had visited Fort Lauderdale just two weeks ago and stated that the city appeared to be a good steward of taxpayer dollars.

“I was kind of surprised,” Glassman said. “I’m wondering why they complimented Fort Lauderdale a couple weeks ago and are now DOGE-ing us. This is a head scratcher.”

But Glassman is open to the inquiry.

“The City Commission has been setting excellent policy,” he said. “I would welcome DOGE to take a look at how management is implementing them. I welcome another set of eyes.”

Florida Chief Financial Officer Blaise Ingoglia, the primary spokesperson and chief auditor for Florida DOGE, spoke at a news conference in Fort Lauderdale on May 26.

“Believe it or not, the city of Fort Lauderdale is a pretty good steward of taxpayer dollars when it comes to the general fund budget,” he said after getting a question about the city’s plans to spend more than $700 million on a new City Hall.

Mayor Dean Trantalis on Thursday also made note of Ingoglia’s remark two weeks ago.

“It was just two weeks ago that Mr. Ingoglia complimented Fort Lauderdale on being good stewards of the general fund,” Trantalis said. “Therefore, this current request comes as a complete surprise. But we’re happy to complete the audit and substantiate his expectations.”

Bill Brown, chair of the city’s budget advisory board, had just gotten out of a budget workshop Wednesday night when he got a call from the Sun Sentinel inquiring about why the city might have drawn the attention of the Florida DOGE team.

The news took him by surprise.

“I’m dumbfounded,” Brown said. “Two weeks ago the CFO praised Fort Lauderdale and said there were no issues.”

Brown questioned the timing.

Cities across the state are warning that sweeping property tax cuts could lead to severe budget shortfalls and dramatic cuts to municipal services if voters say yes in November to a tax break. If the measure passes, Fort Lauderdale and other cities stand to lose millions.

“One has to question why now,” Brown said. “Right when we are in the middle of putting together a budget and the staff is working diligently to get a balanced budget for this year.”

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City officials are in the midst of reviewing the DOGE team’s request for information, according to a statement sent to the Sun Sentinel Wednesday night.

“The city of Fort Lauderdale received the correspondence from the state of Florida on Wednesday, June 10, 2026, and is currently reviewing,” city spokesman Kevin Pulido said. “The city is committed to transparency and cooperating with our state officials. We will gather the information requested in the letter and provide a timely response through the appropriate channels.”

Barbra Stern, a frequent critic of City Hall who plans to run for mayor in 2028, said she is glad to see the state finally taking a look at Fort Lauderdale’s spending.

“I welcome it,” she said. “I’ve been hoping DOGE would look at how we do business in Fort Lauderdale. I’m glad there’s going to be more eyes on our books.”

Stern said she suspects the DOGE team might have taken an interest in Fort Lauderdale after reports all the high-paid new hires at City Hall since the city manager came onboard last year.

Stern also pointed to the recent release of a scathing internal audit spotlighting questionable purchases by employees using city-issued credit cards, known as P-cards.

“I would imagine the P-card audit was a trigger for them,” Stern said.

City Auditor Pat Reilly and his team looked at spending between October 2023 and December 2024 and discovered several questionable and prohibited purchases.

One credit card was used to buy $10,250 in Florida Panthers hockey tickets along with catered food and event parking. The purchases were gifts for certain airport tenants as a show of appreciation but should have been caught and questioned, the audit report said. Instead, they went undetected until uncovered by the audit.

Other prohibited purchases listed in the report: $180,000 of vehicle repairs and modifications; $55,000 of food transactions that exceeded allowable limits; $30,000 of non-travel items purchased with travel cards; $30,000 of telephone/telecommunications expenses; $3,500 for a duplicate payment; $1,500 of retirement gifts in excess of allowable limits; and $1,500 for a computer purchased without pre-approval by Information Technology Services.

Fort Lauderdale’s plans to build a high-priced new City Hall might have raised another red flag, Stern said.

“The grossly inflated price for the new City Hall could also have been a trigger for this,” Stern said. “Take your pick. We’re Fort Lauderdale. Let’s build government buildings and make it iconic instead of functional. Is that the best use of our taxpayer dollars to build iconic buildings? It’s not like this is your own personal money, commissioners.”

The Florida DOGE team requested a massive volume of information from Fort Lauderdale from fiscal year 2024 to fiscal year 2026.

The documents requested are divided into 12 categories.

One category requests a current snapshot of personnel data, to include, for each filled or vacant position:

Employee name and hire date (if filled);
Vacancy date if vacant;
Compensation, including base salary, additional pay to date this fiscal year, pay range, full-time equivalency factor, and employee type (e.g., regular/temporary/contract);
Job classification, including code, title, and other characteristics (e.g., career, exempt, sworn law enforcement, etc.);
Organizational location, including division, department, bureau, unit, supervisor name and position identifier, physical location and telework or remote work status;
Funding source;
Position description.

Another category requests:

Three years of vendor information, including procurement awards;
Continuing services contracts, active task orders and fee schedules;
Vendor rate schedules and unit-pricing matrices, if available, including historical schedules;
Bid tabulation sheets, request scoring sheets, committee notes, and any bid protest or challenge log for all capital-improvement program contracts exceeding $500,000.

Another requests:

Three years of purchase order information, including procurement policies and thresholds at the city or department level;
Purchase order number, vendor, date, amount, department, account code, and project code;
Any transaction pattern analysis performed;
Purchase card transaction log, including card identifier, amount, vendor, and justification.

Another asks for:

Information on all purchase orders and contract payments in excess of $5,000 over a three-year period, including vendor name and address;
Scope and description of goods or services;
Amount, department, fund source, and payment date.

Susannah Bryan can be reached at sbryan@sunsentinel.com. Follow me on X @Susannah_Bryan