Panel prepares a draft plan for purchasing

The report suggests changes that would allow officials to keep track of what's in their storerooms.
By PEGGY SINKOVICHand STEPHEN SIFF
VINDICATOR TRUMBULL STAFF
WARREN -- Trumbull County should make immediate and sweeping changes in the way it buys supplies, a first draft of a report by outside experts says.
The report does not comment on past buying practices by the building maintenance department, which is under investigation by the FBI, Ohio Bureau of Criminal Identification and Investigation and the county auditor.
The investigations began after a series of Vindicator articles detailed poor bookkeeping and excessive spending in the maintenance department.
Unless some changes are made right away, the Blue Ribbon Commission will not be able to come to grips with the problems, according to the report by members Chuck Joseph, a former executive at Delphi Packard Electric, and Ralph Smith, a former executive at Forum Health.
"As currently configured, the system cannot provide data that would be needed to complete the Blue Ribbon Commission's study," the report reads in part.
Purchasing practices
In an early meeting of the commission, maintenance department head Tony Delmont admitted there were no checks and balances on ordering.
The department, which spends more than $250,000 a year, also kept no records of the supplies it had on hand, or the total amount of different products being ordered. None of its suppliers won contracts through competitive bidding, and several appeared to operate simply from post-office boxes.
An inventory conducted by employees of other departments after investigations began found no supplies at all from two companies with which the department had done thousands of dollars worth of business.
Also, in some cases the maintenance department was paying prices higher than what companies had listed in their catalogs.
The draft report suggests a number of bookkeeping changes that would allow officials to keep track of what is in their storerooms and what is being bought.
Commissioners Joseph Angelo and James Tsagaris said they have not had an opportunity to review the draft but plan to do so before today's board meeting. The committee is planning to present the proposal during today's meeting.
The draft also suggests that a storeroom clerk be assigned to receive shipments and to requisition new supplies when inventory runs low. No one is currently doing this duty, county officials said.
The commission also states that a filing system should be created to keep track of orders that have been made and received. Currently, purchase orders and packing slips are kept in a stack of cardboard boxes on a table in the maintenance department.
They also suggested that orders and requisitions could be tracked by computer.
sinkovich@vindy.comsiff@vindy.com