October 4, 2000

Mr. Andrew Viglucci
Editor
The San Juan Star
San Juan, Puerto Rico

Dear Mr. Viglucci:

We refer to Mr. Robert Flores Simpson's letter titled Comptroller needs to revise his role, which was published in The San Juan Star on October 4, 2000. It states that we have yet to understand our role in the government and that we are "[m]essing with the validity of judicial appointments".

Our role is very clearly stated in Article III, Section 22, of the Constitution of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico:

.The Controller shall audit all the revenues, accounts and expenditures of the Commonwealth, of its agencies and instrumentalities and of its municipalities, in order to determine whether they have been made in accordance with law.

Clearly we have a constitutional mandate to oversee the legal use of public funds and property. And it is our duty to publish audit reports informing the Governor and the Legislature of our findings. We are not part of the Judicial System and we have no quasi-judicial functions. This means that we must express our official opinion on any irregular or illegal transaction involving public funds and property, but we cannot invalidate the transaction or revoke any law related to it. We refer our findings to the proper authorities and they are the ones responsible for any additional measures, including taking legal action before the courts.

Mr. Simpson may be able to fully understand our audit opinion regarding the judicial appointments, if he goes to our Website at http://www.ocpr.gov.pr and reads our Audit Report DB-00-20, published on March 24, 2000; and Audit Reports DB-01-13, DB-01-14, and DB-01-15, published on August 31, 2000. The first one concerns the legality of the appointment of the Ombudsman and includes the opinion of our attorneys on the matter. The other three concern judicial appointments in similar circumstances. We are sure once he examines this material he will agree that we have fulfilled our constitutional duty, even if he still does not agree with our conclusions.

We count on your cooperation to improve the oversight function and administration of public funds and property.

Cordially,

Manuel Díaz Saldaña

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