At the request of Williams County Job & Family Services, county commissioners on Thursday approved the use of procurement cards by JFS for some clients in need.
The cards are a type of charge card used for smaller purchases. The ones approved Thursday are state-funded and will be used primarily by JFS to assist clients in need, according to county JFS Fiscal Officer Judy Preston, who attended the meeting with county JFS Director Fred Lord and Vickie Grimm and Parker Houk from the county auditor’s office.
Preston said the cards will only be used for clients who need help with clothing or transportation or other work-related items, or in kinship cases in which, for instance, grandparents who are awarded custody need immediate help with the additional expenses involved in caring for one or more children.
“Those are the uses we would like to use the procurement card for … these client-centered purchases, in order to help them start a job, or help (kinship) with the things they can’t afford, in order to encourage them to take children into their home,” she said.
Preston said the Ohio Revised Code forbids JFS from using its agency credit cards for client purchases. Grimm said procurement card purchases are tax exempt, the cards offer better security and flexibility than other payment forms, such as purchase orders, and are more accepted by businesses.
And, added Lord, most businesses, including Walmart, do not accept vouchers now.
Grimm said Houk will provide training to JFS on card use and JFS will provide the auditor’s office with the receipts.
“We will control it in-house,” Preston said. “Our plan is that (JFS employees) will sign it out, they will go with the individual to make the purchase, they will pay for it. And they will come back, they will put the card back in our cabinet, and we will submit the receipts to whatever process has to take place after that.”
It’s a need whose time has come, Grimm said.
“It will be an additional work on our office to do that, but I think for (JFS), especially, it is a good way to help,” she said.
She said because of their advantages, procurement cards are becoming more in demand.
“People have been asking me since I have been in office for procurement cards, so this is something that is probably going to open up to the whole county. We would like to start slow and see how that works out,” Grimm said. Commissioners agreed Thursday, saying they are approving the card for JFS only at this time.
Preston said she had no way to accurately gauge how much JFS would spend in a year but estimated it at $6,000, perhaps less.
“We have to submit a (spending) plan to the state that outlines how we are going to serve our clients. We have limits on those, what (we are) permitted to spend these monies on, and we submit it to the state, they approve it. We have our ceilings, there are even time limits … there is a plan that says how we can use this money,” said Preston. “And again, the issue here is purchasing things for our clients in order for them to work, which is what we want.”
Commission President Terry Rummel, who is the county commission point person for JFS, said the need is real and the cards offer a solution in meeting JFS clients needs.
“It is huge. I mean, kinship placement, when we drop these kids off at a grandma’s house and these kids have absolutely nothing. This is such a huge need everywhere that I have seen … we absolutely have to move forward if this can make that process any smoother,” Rummel said.
