Reform county fleet policy

Admittedly, residents of Salt Lake County don't yet know a great deal about County Mayor-elect Peter Corroon. But during his campaign for mayor, Corroon said many times that he would streamline county government.

May we suggest he start with the county's vehicle fleet program. A volunteer panel, convened in the wake of the county's "guzzlegate" scandal, found the program is "poorly managed, suffers from a systemic lack of oversight and needs a massive overhaul," the group's report stated.

For a candidate who vowed during the mayoral campaign to "look for more efficiencies" in county government, Corroon appeared cool to some of the five-member panel's recommendations, which included halting the fleet's purchasing program until a comprehensive study is done.

We're not suggesting that Corroon should exhibit foot-stomping outrage over the panel's findings. But average citizens bristle at the knowledge that the county has more cars than it needs, that there's a $9 million unnecessary surplus in the county's vehicle replacement fund and that three county cars were replaced after being driven only 11 miles each. If that's not enough, the report also found that some employees put unnecessary mileage on their county-owned vehicles to keep their assigned cars.

Vern Della-Piana described the state of the program as "out of control."

Perhaps Salt Lake County residents have yet to grow accustomed to Corroon's management style. Seemingly, there's ample reason to lead out on reforms of the county vehicle fleet. While he and the Salt Lake County Council will call the shots regarding the management of the county's fleet, the volunteer panel has exposed significant problems that need to be addressed as soon as possible.

Surely Corroon appreciates that he was elected because he represented the opportunity for a fresh start in county government. After "guzzlegate" and former Mayor Nancy Workman's legal problems and the passage of a new ethics policy on the part of the Salt Lake County Council, residents of Salt Lake County are expecting a high degree of accountability from the Corroon administration as well as the County Council.

Neither Corroon nor the County Council is bound by the volunteer panel's recommendations. But after spending an estimated $120,000 on the review and logging some 500 hours of interviews on a comprehensive look at the county's fleet management, the incoming mayor and council owe it to taxpayers to consider the problems revealed by the volunteer panel high priorities.