The City of Doral has initiated a new one-year fraud detection pilot program for homeowners’ and condo owners’ associations for its residents.

The pilot program is designed to fill a gap and create a structured process within the city’s police department to evaluate whether a complaint may constitute actual fraud, provide residents with a pathway to present credible documentation, and advance only those cases that meet the legal threshold for investigation and potential prosecution.

The program will determine how many hours of investigation work will be required, whether the city will need an ongoing external financial forensic support, or whether long-term this dysfunction should be supported by dedicated personnel within the police department, said Mayor Christi Fraga, who sponsored the item at last week’s city council meeting.

“It is entirely possible we receive a handful of cases or hundreds of cases. We simply just don’t know the data today,” she said. “This is why I think a responsible approach is implementing this one-year pilot program to study and look at what we can solve and how much it will cost during this period. The city will absorb the associated costs with training and outside financial auditing services. We will track utilization outcomes and resource demands, and we will evaluate whether the program is sustainable, scalable, or requires restructuring.”

At the conclusion of the pilot, the police department would have real data to answer critical policy questions, including whether a dedicated funding mechanism is necessary, whether a fee structure should be considered, or whether cost recovery is possible in cases where fraud is successfully prosecuted, and what the appropriate long-term model should be, she explained.

Mayor Fraga said she has met with the US Attorney’s Office and the state attorney regarding this issue and they are committed to strongly supporting Doral in prosecuting cases.

“When allegations rise to the level of potential financial fraud, organized schemes, or exploitation, especially of our seniors or vulnerable populations, our police department has both the authority and the obligation to investigate, provided there is sufficient evidence to support such claims,” she said.