The very-first sentence of a blockbuster King County Auditor’s report released last month contained an eye-popping finding: The county’s Department of Community and Human Services awarded more than $1.5 billion in grant funding in 2023-2024, up from $22 million in 2019-2020.

That’s an increase of 6,700%. How could spending have increased so drastically?

The answer: It didn’t.

King County Auditor Kymber Waltmunson informed the Metropolitan King County Council on Tuesday of a significant error in the recent audit. DCHS grant funding actually increased from $922 million in 2019-2020 to $1.8 billion in 2023-2024, an increase of 95%.

That’s a big increase, but hardly on the scale of what had initially been reported in the audit.

“The data was not comprehensive because, as a point-in-time s

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