The Jackson County Commissioners unanimously approved contracting for an independent audit of their permitting and code enforcement operations. No money is missing, directly anyway. Instead, county leaders are concerned some buildings may not be compliant and recordkeeping could be lax. The curiosity followed an allegation by exiting county planner Gerald Green that he had been deprived of the ability to enforce county erosion-control codes. He pointed the finger at Permitting Director Tony Elders, who passed the buck as well. Statements following from County Manager Chuck Wooten have left all concerned concluding nobody had been enforcing the ordinances since 2012, and I don’t rightly recall hearing of any problems of consequence.
But nobody asked me. County Commissioners must now right the wrong with official corrective action that includes the development of an organizational chart with, among other things, the stricture that the new permitting and planning head be directly under the county manager; and managerial monitoring of the permitting process that includes tracking reports for the commissioners. See 1, 2, 3.
