A work session to discuss recommendations in the PSU report was well attended today with a wide audience that included former commissioner Fred Messerle and the mathematically challenged Lance Benton. Commissioner Melissa Cribbins chaired the work session and began by announcing that any discussion of hiring an administrator was off the table owing to the voters clear opposition to the concept. Both commissioner John Sweet and Cribbins appear to be interested in exploring the idea of hiring or at least naming a budget/finance director.

Most of the discussion centered around how the county budget is structured and that it is considered difficult to understand and that the county should consider adopting a cost accounting system. As an old cost accountant I can see the merits of employing this type of system to track department progress and establishing the mechanisms necessary shouldn’t be that hard to implement. Conversely, governments run differently than businesses and I am not sure how much benefit there would be within the confines of a fixed budget. Additional concerns raised had to do with Treasurer Mary Barton having absorbed many tasks over the years and there is concern there is no trained replacement to take over should she leave her post for any reason. Mary Barton may already have staff that understand enough of what is going on to fill in for her if the need arises but if not, producing a detailed job description wouldn’t be a bad idea.

Benton left early but Messerle freely interjected his opinion beginning with his usual folksy and somewhat indecipherable style. “Well, I think we have to focus on the doughnut rather than the doughnut hole…” at which point I lost focus so we will have to wait for the video.

The net result of the meeting is that there will likely be another work session. The good thing was that the public was invited to engage freely in the discussion.