Ball: “very competent employees”
MONTICELLO – Officials from an outside accounting firm retained
to assess conditions in Sullivan County’s Division of Family Services
like what they see.
Two members of The Bonadio Group, based in Pittsford NY, presented a detailed
report at to the county legislature on Thursday.
Late last year, the division was in disarray in large part because of
a growing backlog of Home Heating Assistance Program (HEAP) applications.
Bonadio Manager Timothy Ball said one key factor that stands out now in
DFS is the people currently running it, notably Acting Commissioner Joseph
Todora and consultant Dr. William Moon.
“What we’ve seen in the very beginning is that the DFS has
a lot of very competent employees,” Ball said. “It currently
has a very competent head with Joe, and William Moon as deputy. And just
a side word about William Moon, he has tons and loads of experience.”
One thing Ball said he felt in his time so far is a greatly improved attitude
in the department. He said there has been a general sense of change and
a general sense of things getting better. That has come through working
specifically with the Temporary Assistance and Food Stamps.
“We’ve had meetings with individual employees and we’ve
had meetings with supervisors and we’ve talked about supervisor
roles and we talked about how you can keep an eye on what managers are
doing, and vice versa, your managers can come to you with issues. We’ve
opened up those gateways and we’ve helped open up those gateways.”
Todora said the work Bonadio and DFS are doing is clearly forward-looking.
“[I] think the critical aspect of what we’re talking about
today, what we’ll be talking about a month, two months, three months
from now is, where do we want to be.”
The services offered by Bonadio will cost Sullivan $150,000 for a year.
That’s a bargain, said Todora.
“I don’t know that this body has spent $150,000 any more,
any better than they would with this contract.”
