The District has long known that its most troubled department, the agency serving the disabled and mentally retarded, overspent its fiscal year 2006 budget by $18 million, but a new audit suggests those “spending pressures” might have been violations of the law.

The audit, produced by the D.C. inspector general at the request of D.C. Council Member Adrian Fenty, chairman of the human services committee, found multiple spending actions by the Mental Retardation and Developmental Disabilities Administration “resulted in apparent violations of the District’s and federal anti-deficiency laws.”