Greenville County ad hoc committee members met in a workshop-style session to open Phase 1 of a county performance evaluation and agreed to begin by auditing public-safety operations, contracting performance and certain county fee uses.

The committee — chaired by the county chair (unnamed in the transcript) — discussed potential audit topics on Tuesday, with members repeatedly pointing to the sheriff’s office and Emergency Medical Services (EMS) as likely places to seek efficiency gains. County Administrator (unnamed in the transcript) outlined how staff would procure outside reviewers and described the timeline and data the committee could expect.

The discussion focused on three broad areas: public-safety staffing and overtime use; how awarded contracts perform after execution; and smaller expenditure streams and special fees, including the county’s “Filo” (fee-in-lieu/FELO) receipts, the $25 road maintenance fee and the annual storm-water fee. The County Administrator said detailed accounting exists for those funds: “There it goes. You can see every dollar that’s spent out of that fund. Every single dollar,” and added that the storm-water fee “goes into a storm water fund. It’s not commingled with other funds and that’s where it’s expended.”

On the Filo distribution the administrator summarized the current allocation rule discussed: “The first 31% stays with the county,” with the remainder distributed proportionally to taxing entities by millage. The administrator said an ordinance has been drafted to reflect distribution rules that will go into effect with the next collection period and that staff can provide a full accounting of prior uses, including transfers to the general fund.

Committee members asked whether infrastructure-bank or FELO money could be used for pay raises; the administrator said county council controls allocations each budget cycle and that historically infrastructure funds were directed to road improvements and debt service, citing the Woodruff Road Bypass as an example of prior debt service paid from those funds.

On procurement and the review process, the administrator described an RFP-based approach for hiring outside auditors or management consultants. He said staff will draft a scope and suggested leaving an RFP open for about 30 days to allow qualified firms to respond: “I would suggest we leave it out for 30 days just so people have time because it’s a lot of information we’ll ask for back.” He added there is no prequalification barrier for respondents: “We have no prequalification.”

Members discussed whether to bundle reviews or issue separate RFPs for different departments. The administrator recommended tailoring scopes by department (for example, a law-enforcement staffing review will differ from an IT review) and noted it would be feasible to do more than one department at a time or an overall staffing review across county departments.

Committee members asked for purchase-card (P-card) records and related backup. The administrator said six months of P-card usage and receipts had been collected and could be made available to an independent reviewer: “We have the support for every single purchase that was made, for the 6 months anyway,” and confirmed auditors would be given access to the county’s accounting system and scanned backups.

While no final audit contract was awarded during the meeting, the committee agreed to direct staff to prepare RFP drafts and other procurement materials and to reconvene for action. Members proposed reconvening on the 25th (date given in the meeting audio as “twenty-fifth”) to formalize the scope and move toward advertising the RFPs.

Votes at a glance: the meeting record shows a motion to approve the minutes early in the session and a motion to adjourn at the end. In both cases the transcript records vocal agreement (“Aye”) but does not record mover/second or a roll-call tally.