The long, detailed process of updating Isabella County’s policies is one step closer to completion after commissioners unanimously approved changes to several procedures.
Among the policies meticulously rewritten and unanimously supported were those related to procurement, grant funding and credit cards, some garnering months of attention from County Administrator/Controller Margaret McAvoy and others.
“Those are big rewrites,” McAvoy said. “The truth is I’ve been working on revising policies since 2013...the purchasing policy had 14 drafts before it went to the board. But we’ve been really hitting it hard since the end of last year.”
Some of those policies were written 10 years ago or longer, and a lot has changed in that time; McAvoy said her goal is to make procedures more concise while meeting legal requirements.
Among changes in the procurement policies, a purchase now does not automatically have to again go before commissioners if that item is already included in the county budget.
That revision should help to prevent duplicate efforts among department heads and elected officals, McAvoy said.
“Perhaps most importantly, the recommendations include necessary legal verbiage that was not in effect at the time of the latest amendment,” McAvoy wrote in the policy proposal.
The county’s credit card policy is now tied to new guidelines within the procurement policy, making the purchasing process more clear and intuitive for the user.
The newly-approved policy now meets modern standards; it was last revised in 2008, before the most recent federal audit guidelines.
Finally, county commissioners approved revisions to the county’s grant policies, bringing them inline with federal requirements.
At last week’s work session, McAvoy praised the team working with her to update the county’s policies and thanked the board for their attention.
“I’m gratified to get (the revisions) to the board,” she said. “They are such a great board. They read, they are involved and informed and ask good questions. I was really happy those policies got approved and are effective immediately.”
Next, McAvoy said she plans to draft revisions to the non-representative employee handbook, which hasn’t been altered since before the massive federal changes like the Affordable Care Act.