Agenda 05-24-22; 8-a - Minutes - Laserfiche WebLink

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13 1 1) BOCC members may resign positions as directors, officers, or governing board 2 members of any nonprofit covered by the new law if that nonprofit receives outside 3 agency funds from or otherwise contracts with the County. 4 5 2) The BOCC approves 1.2% of general fund county revenue to be awarded to outside 6 agencies and authorizes the County Manager to allocate the funds. If the BOCC does 7 not agree with any allocation, that allocation could be addressed through a budget 8 amendment at which time a commissioner with a conflict could be easily excused or 9 recused. This would eliminate direct involvement in an award by a covered 10 commissioner. 11 12 3) An alternative suggested by the UNC School of Government is to adopt "a practice of 13 stripping non-profits from (the) general budget ordinance and then including those 14 nonprofits later via budget amendments. That procedure allows conflicted-out board 15 members to vote on the general budget ordinance but recuse themselves from 16 amendment voting." Similar to the first two options, utilizing this approach would 17 eliminate the risk to individual board members. This could be done at the same meeting 18 at which the budget is adopted because North Carolina General Statute (NCGS) 159-15 19 allows amendments, with few limitations, at any time after the budget ordinance is 20 adopted. 21 22 4) Another alternative suggested by the UNC School of Government is to "vote on pieces of 23 the budget in stages prior to adopting the final budget ordinance. While these votes are 24 not binding, they allow the board to make individual policy decisions as they work 25 through the budgeting process. This preliminary vote process offers a potential strategy 26 for handling conflicts arising from a member's financial interest in a particular budget 27 provision. Under this approach, the Board would take a preliminary (nonbinding) vote on 28 the budget provision that involves the Board member's interest and excuse the 29 interested member from voting on it. If the matter passes, then it can be incorporated 30 into the final version of the budget ordinance. When the board member later votes on the 31 final version of the budget ordinance, it will be clear from the preliminary vote that the 32 member's vote was not necessary to approve the provision that involves his or her 33 financial interest." This approach still carries risk due to the fact that impacted 34 commissioners are still voting on the problematic item even though they earlier recused 35 themselves. The new law prohibits any involvement. 36 37 The first three options eliminate risk to covered commissioners. In addition to minimizing or 38 eliminating risk to covered commissioners, options one through three also eliminate even the 39 appearance of impropriety under the new law. As noted above, option four does not eliminate 40 all risk. 41 42 John Roberts, County Attorney, introduced the item. He reviewed the materials in the 43 agenda packet. He said that he had previously asked the commissioners to provide a list of the 44 non-profit agencies that they serve on, and he said that most of those were state or local 45 government created. He said those agencies would be exempt from the rule, even if they 46 contract with or receive funding from the county. He said that he only saw three non-profit 47 agencies that may present problems with the upcoming budget: Community Home Trust, Child 48 Care Services Association, and Voices Together. He said it would only affect Chair Price and 49 Commissioner McKee. He said that the commissioners needed to decide how they wanted to 50 approach the issue. He said that they cannot have two separate votes on the budget, and 51 funding for these non-profits is made through the budget. He said that he did not think the