A slew of staff members have left the Massachusetts State Auditor’s Office since Diana DiZoglio took over in January 2023, including two chiefs of staff and a former lawmaker who was tapped to lead audits into the state’s largest agency, according to records obtained by the Herald.
DiZoglio entered the office tasked with promoting government transparency and efficiency after campaigning on a pledge to shine a light on Beacon Hill’s opaque inner workings. She quickly became locked in a battle with the Legislature over an audit of their business and is probing the use of nondisclosure agreements in Massachusetts.
But her tenure has been marked by the departure of at least 58 staff members of all levels since Jan. 20, 2023, or two days after DiZoglio assumed the position following her election to the post in 2022, according to a list her office compiled in response to a public records request.
Former staffers who spoke to the Herald said they left for varying reasons and offered different characterizations of DiZoglio’s management style and motivations for probing certain areas.
Kyle Yancik, a former field auditor who started in March 2020 and left in July 2023, said he worked on the initial stages of an audit into the use of nondisclosure agreements in state government just before he left for another auditing job.
In an interview with the Herald, Yancik said he felt that the probe of nondisclosure agreements “was very political” because of DiZoglio’s past history with them.
The Methuen Democrat violated her own nondisclosure agreement when she spoke out in 2018 and has made the issue a central plank of her political career. She released a critical report last month on the use of the agreements across multiple state agencies.
“My impression was she really didn’t know too much about the role of the Auditor’s Office and then she came in and wanted to put a political twist (on it) is my opinion,” Yancik said. “She really, when she came in, ruffled a lot of feathers, made a lot of changes, and didn’t really listen to the employees who were speaking up to managers and directors. She kind of said, ‘Well, if they don’t like it, they can leave.’”
But other staff members who worked with DiZoglio and her top deputies pushed back on any notion that she pursued audits with politics in mind and pointed to the generally accepted auditing guidelines that attempt to ensure reports are accurate and unbiased.
One former employee, who requested anonymity because they still work in state government and did not want to jeopardize their current job, said the Auditor’s Office received guidance for auditing the Legislature from the U.S. Government Accountability Office’s Center for Audit Excellence.
“The other thing to think about is, Diana DiZoglio is not writing these audits herself and neither did (former Auditor) Suzanne Bump, and shocking, neither did (former Auditor) Joe DeNucci. That’s not what they do. They have a large number of audit staff that are doing the work and everything else,” the former employee told the Herald.
But even as the former employee defended DiZoglio, the person said they did not “necessarily agree” with some of the tactics she takes.
“Sometimes the tone can be quite aggressive and not everything needs to be a fight,” the person said.
A spokesperson for DiZoglio did not make the auditor available for an interview.
In a written statement, DiZoglio said fighting for bold and meaningful reforms in government while uncovering millions in fraud “requires employees who are fully committed to our mission, put in a full day’s work for taxpayers, pass background checks, and act professionally.”
“Since I don’t use taxpayer dollars to silence my critics through NDAs, as others may do, folks can say whatever they want about me for your story — even if it’s critical. That’s the way it should be across state government,” she said.
For this story, the Herald requested a list of all employees who departed or were terminated from the Auditor’s Office since Jan. 1, 2023, a list of all employees who were hired since then, and any separation or nondisclosure agreements between the office and former employees signed in that timeframe.
In response to the records request, the State Auditor’s Office produced a list of employees who had departed — including their title, name, and dates of hire and departure — and a list of those who had been hired, but the office declined to release termination details related to particular employees.
A lawyer for the office also said it could not provide any separation agreements or nondisclosure agreements signed by departing or terminated employees since Jan. 1, 2023 because the agency did “not have records responsive to the … requests.”
“Please note that the OSA’s current administration has issued a policy… prohibiting the use of non-disclosure, confidentiality, or non-disparagement clauses or similarly restrictive language in any OSA employee settlement agreement,” the lawyer said in an email to the Herald.
The departures since DiZoglio took over the office go beyond rank-and-file workers and extend into some of the most senior staff positions, including chief of staff.
DiZoglio’s first chief of staff, longtime public servant Keith Chaney, was hired on Jan. 19, 2023 but left less than a month later on Feb. 11, 2023, according to the records provided by the State Auditor’s Office.
Chaney declined to comment on his time working for DiZoglio and his reason for leaving when reached by the Herald.
Chaney was replaced by Stephanie Neal-Johnson, another veteran state worker who previously spent time at the Executive Office of Labor and Workforce Development and the Massachusetts Department of Transportation.
Neal-Johnson lasted longer as chief of staff, serving for eight months from March 12, 2023 to Nov. 18, 2023, according to the public records. Neal-Johnson declined to comment when reached by the Herald.
The spokesperson for DiZoglio did not answer a question from the Herald seeking more information on Neal-Johnson and Chaney’s departures.
Another former employee, who spoke to the Herald on the condition of anonymity because they feared retaliation, said a “significant percentage” of people who still work at the State Auditor’s Office are “miserable.”
“They just are afraid to speak, afraid to leave,” the former employee said. “It’s not an environment where people feel like they can be free to make mistakes and really engage in a meaningful way. They don’t.”
Multiple directors of subject-specific audit areas have left DiZoglio’s office since she took over, including staff members who specialized in investigations into the judiciary, education, and independent authorities.
DiZoglio had at least two different people cycle through as director of audits into the Executive Office of Health and Human Services, the largest state agency responsible for the MassHealth program.
Barry Ahearn, who worked in the office for nearly 30 years and held the post at the end of his tenure there, left two days after DiZoglio took over, according to the records. Ahearn was replaced weeks later by Tami Gouveia, a former Democratic lawmaker from Acton who parted ways with the office at the start of June 2023.
Gouveia, who now works at Boston University, said she was hired at the Auditor’s Office as an interim employee and had a “great experience” working with the team focused on the Executive Office of Health and Human Services.
“I was negotiating for the position I currently hold now at Boston University. There isn’t any other reason having to do with the Auditor’s Office about why I left since it was always the plan to stay five to six months. I enjoyed my time there and would’ve stayed had I not gotten my dream job at Boston University,” Gouveia said in a statement to the Herald.
Another decades-long Office of the State Auditor employee, Joseph Arguijo, who started with the office in 1995 and last served as the director of judiciary audits before leaving in November 2023, said he “loved” his time at the office and left because it was “time for a change.”
Arguijo, who worked under Bump and DeNucci, said DiZoglio was always “very approachable” and people “could call her out of the blue, you could just talk to her.”
He said there was “a lot of turnover” when Bump took over the job in 2011.
“(Bump) brought in some people that maybe didn’t fit as well as she thought,” he told the Herald. “So I don’t know if it’s unusual for DiZoglio’s administration or not. That’s just my perspective. It didn’t seem like anything unusual to me to see people come in and then leave shortly thereafter.”
