The Pasco County Commission has approved spending $150,000 on a transition audit, as the Pasco County Sheriff’s Office prepares to shift operation of the county’s jail to the county’s administration.
The county will assume financial and administrative responsibility for operating the jail as of Oct. 1.
As it prepares for the conversion, a transition audit will be performed by an external auditor to review assets and liabilities.
The audit was recommended by Pasco County Clerk & Comptroller Nikki Alvarez-Sowles, during the board’s April 5 meeting.
The clerk’s office will negotiate contract terms and sign the contract once the terms are finalized and a vendor is selected, according to backup materials in the county board’s April 19 agenda packet.
When Alvarez-Sowles suggested the transition audit, she told the board: “You want to know, as a county board, what you’re getting with that transfer of a major function for the county.
“It’s important to know what we’re getting, as a county, from the sheriff, from Day One.”
County Administrator Dan Biles also touched on the topic of shifting jail operations to the county’s control.
Biles said there have been several meetings over the last few weeks between the county’s team and the sheriff’s team.
He said he wasn’t ready to provide an update yet, but expected to be able to provide some timelines soon.
Biles said the county attorney has provided a couple of attorneys to work on the issue and that the clerk has been involved in those meetings.
“There’s a lot that’s been happening behind the scenes. HR (Human Resources) has been in the jail several times to talk to all of the existing employees about working for the county and what that means to them.
“We’re working through it, we just don’t have a whole lot to report today,” Biles said.
The clerk thanked the county board for approving the budget amendment to pay for the audit.
“My inspector general is reaching out to various auditing firms to help us with the transition audit,” she said.
The clerk said the audit is intended to “look at what assets they have, to verify those assets and also to do a reconciliation of the assets, as well as any liabilities.”
She told the board she would let them know when a contract has been signed.
Published April 27, 2022
