Jim McKay

James (Jim) McKay served as the Federal Inspector General of the Interstate Commerce Commission, as well as the Deputy Comptroller of the Office of Justice Programs at the Department of Justice. Jim was the 2019 recipient of the National Grants Management Association’s (NGMA) Newton Award. This award recognizes outstanding, sustained leadership in the grants management field. The award also recognizes professionals who have executed sensitive and difficult assignments in grants policy or administration. Other criteria include having articulated a vision for grants management professionals that has made a positive change in the profession. Jim’s federal financial management career spans 41 years. He spent the last eight years of his government career as the Deputy Comptroller of the Office of Justice Programs (OJP) managing a $30 billion active grant portfolio that included grants to state and local governments, Native American, Alaskan, Territorial and not-for-profit recipients. Highlights of this tenure include development and implementation of the agency’s grant financial management infrastructure including its strategic risk-based grant monitoring program and successful installation of its accounting system. The portfolio received consistent, unmodified financial statement audit opinions. Starting his career as a Government Accountability Office (GAO) program evaluator, Jim then became a charter GAO financial auditor upon the establishment of its audit division. Moving to the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), he helped implement the agency’s internal control program. At that time, he co-chaired the interagency workgroup that revised Circular A-123, Management’s Responsibility for Internal Controls. Jim McKay received the agency’s highest award for helping achieve the HUD Secretary’s first annual internal controls assurance statement.