Citizens Question Wakulla County Travel Expense Policies

The Editor,

{sidebar id=1}Both the Wakulla County Board of County Commissioners and the Wakulla Clerk of Court are aware of the need for Florida’s State and local governments to trim their budgets and tax burdens on their citizens. Many consider this a Florida budget crisis. Under this state of affairs, it behooves all government entities to minimize their expenditures to what is absolutely necessary to serve a government purpose, including County Commissioners’ travel. We are concerned with Wakulla County’s implementation of policies dealing with Commissioners’ travel. Also of concern are the procedures used by the Wakulla County’s Clerk of Court Office to pay for County Commissioners’ travel-related expenses. The slapdash handling of Commissioner Brimner’s travel expenses for July 12 - 20, 2007 highlighted these concerns to us.

During October of 2003, the Wakulla Board of County Commissioners decided that County Commissioners’ travel must be approved in advance. However, during October of 2005, the Commission decided that the approval of County Commissioners’ travel would be through the “Consent Agenda” process. We interpret this to mean that a Commissioner’s travel should be approved in advance and, if it is not approved in advance, there is no guarantee that it will be approved after the fact and a Commissioner will be reimbursed for expenses incurred.

We are not aware that Commissioner Brimner’s July 12 -20 trip was pre or post approved by the Wakulla Board of County Commissioners. The US Forest Service invitation for Wakulla County Commissioners to attend their training conference was issued in February of 2007. Certainly, Commissioner Brimner had more than ample time to request approval for his travel at regular County Commission meetings prior to the July Commission meeting. Was Commissioner Brimner’s decision to travel a hasty last-minute decision? How was Commissioner Brimner selected from the five Wakulla Commissioners to represent Wakulla at the training conference?

If our interpretation of Wakulla’s policies relative to approval of a Commissioner’s travel stated above is not correct, it raises questions:

The Wakulla County budget contains a $10,000 item for Wakulla County Commissioners’ travel expenses.

If prior approval for travel is not required, how is this money allocated among the Commissioners?
Is it first come, first served gets to travel?
Would it not be possible for one Commissioner to use up the total budget in the first several months of a budget year and make it impossible for other Commissioners to receive reimbursement for their travel?
If Commissioner Brimner did not need prior approval for travel for a purpose that he himself deemed appropriate, would it not be possible for another Commissioner at Wakulla County’s expense to attend a week-long conference in Portland, Oregon or Toronto, Canada on how to design public walking trails through rural areas?
If Commissioner Brimner did not need prior approval for travel to a location of his choosing, would it not be possible for another Commissioner to approve his own travel to a week-long conference on ecotourism in Paris, France?
If a Commission Brimner did not need prior approval to travel on a date that conflicted with Wakulla Board of County Commissioners scheduled monthly meetings, would it not be possible for another Commissioner at Wakulla County’s expense to attend an ecotourism class scheduled on the first Monday night of each month for the next six months?

Clerk of Court Brent X. Thurmond in his July 24th response (posted on www.wakulla.com) to the Wakulla Board of County Commissioners’ failure to address outstanding bills and vouchers at their July 16th regular meeting stated:

“As far as releasing checks (other then utility payments…) not already approved by the BOCC, I refer to AGO 2001029…, which in essence dealt with whether the Board had to approve the payments or whether they could delegate that to other parties. The AGO states, ‘the initial determination of whether an expenditure serves a county purpose may not be delegated to the Clerk of Court.’ It is a legislative function of the Board, and cannot be delegated to anyone else, whether a department head, a county administrator, or the Clerk of Court.”

Clerk of Court Thurmond in his response then quoted the Florida Attorney General April 23, 2001 letter to the Flagler County Attorney:

“There is nothing in Florida law that allows the clerk’s pre-auditing function to supplant the commission’s duty to make a legislative finding that expenditures of county funds are for a county purpose.”

Considering Clerk of Court Thurmond’s interpretation of applicable law and the facts that there was no Wakulla County prior or post approval of Commissioner Brimner’s July 12 – 20 travel, under what authority did the Wakulla Clerk of Court Office furnish two checks in the amount of $243 and $660 to Commissioner Brimner to cover his travel expenses? We do understand, Commissioner Brimner returned the checks uncashed. They are now marked void. However, this does not mitigate the fact that they were issued and could have been cashed.

Sincerely,

Jimmie Doyle, Crawfordville
Suzanne Smith, Crawfordville
Hugh Taylor, Tallahassee
Jack Whaley, Crawfordville
Victor W. Lambou, Crawfordville

This letter originally published on August 7, 2007.