For a vital but mundane topic, the process of preparing budgets has stirred up all sorts of drama lately within Salt Lake County government.

County Auditor Greg Hawkins, a Republican, and a half-dozen members of his staff stood up and walked out of the County Council chambers Nov. 1, when Democratic Mayor Peter Corroon recommended, in his 2012 budget address, that future budget preparations be moved to his office from the auditor's.

Hawkins' subsequent threat to sue over the proposal compelled the council to go into a closed session Tuesday to talk about the potential litigation. The discussion was supposed to take 15 minutes. It lasted more than an hour.

Later in the meeting, Corroon's chief financial officer, Darrin Casper, accused Hawkins of telling the county's other elected officials to ignore some of Casper's requests for budget-related information. That prompted Hawkins to jump up from his seat at the back of the room and protest that "to make a blanket statement like that is slanderous."

When Council Chairman Max Burdick, a Republican, later asked Hawkins to come up to the front and speak into a microphone, the first-term auditor complied. But, he added, "I'm not sure my back's covered up here."

The roots for this discord go back to the "GFOA Report," the shorthanded name used for a study by the Government Finance Officers Association on the organizational structure of the county's financial-management system.

Finalized in October, the report said Salt Lake County's effectiveness, efficiency and collaboration could be improved by several changes to its organizational structure. Implemented as a package, the consultants said, the revisions would help the county achieve its goals of "improved accountability and transparency, improved county services and reduced operating costs."

The report's primary recommendations call for moving all budget preparations and revenue forecasting from the Auditor's Office to the Mayor's Office.

"Many policy and programmatic proposals are made through the proposed budget. The budget is typically the single most important recurring policy process undertaken by a government," GFOA advised, contending the consolidation of budget and knowledge skills in a single office would help the county's chief executive "perform long-term scenario analysis."

Both Casper and the council's fiscal analyst, David Delquadro, support the recommendations, noting that the changes would enable the Auditor's Office to spend more time performing audits.

But Hawkins and his chief deputy, Lonn Litchfield, contend the changes would be potentially dangerous for county residents, removing an outside perspective on budgeting that preserves a system of checks and balances.

The relationship between the Auditor's Office and the county's executive and legislative branches, Hawkins added, should not be collaborative.

In a PowerPoint presentation, Litchfield spelled out his "Top 10" reasons why the auditor should be involved in budgeting. No. 1 on the list: Moving the auditor's budget and revenue analysts into the Mayor's Office would give the chief executive a monopoly on the county's financial figures to the detriment of an understaffed council.

He cited a couple of cases in which government executives inflated revenue projections to get budgets passed, leaving it to councils to work out difficult details when those revenue numbers fell short.

Corroon, serving his second and final term as mayor, objected to that characterization. Since the Mayor's Office would be responsible for the budget, he said, it would "have to live with the consequences of revenue and expenditure levels."

Litchfield also maintained the departmental changes would cost the county in terms of money and morale and could end up jeopardizing its cherished AAA bond rating.

Casper disputed both points. He said bond ratings are based on other factors, such as debt ratios and the diversity of an area's economy, and that "there is an expectation of AAA counties to improve, so we are."

Although Litchfield said the GFOA report did not identify a need to change the system quickly, the council is likely to deal with two ordinance amendments Tuesday that would move six full-time employees from the Auditor's Office to the Mayor's Office next year and would designate the mayor as the budget officer.

A supermajority of six of the nine council members is needed to make the mayor the budget officer. Differing opinions expressed Tuesday by the five Republicans and four Democrats on the council indicated there's little certainty how that vote might turn out.

Democrat Randy Horiuchi supported the move, questioning whether the county would increase its financial risk if it asked an independent consultant to evaluate its performance and then disregarded that advice.

But Republican Richard Snelgrove wondered why the county should alter an organizational structure that had attained a AAA bond rating. Adding "change for the sake of change," he said, "is not a sound approach to take."

Then there is Councilman Steve DeBry, a Republican, who said he was uncertain which side was right. "When I decide on that," he said, "that's how I'll vote."

mikeg@sltrib.com

Twitter: @sltribmikeg —

Consultant's recommendations

Suggested changes to Salt Lake County's governmental structure by the Chicago-based Government Finance Officers Association (GFOA):

• Make the mayor the budget officer, consolidating budget preparation and administration in the chief executive's office (very highly recommended).

• Move revenue projections from the Auditor's Office to the Mayor's Office (recommended).

• Move financial-transaction processing to the mayor from the auditor (highly recommended).

• Revise capital budgeting process (highly recommended).

• Retain current internal audit structure (very highly recommended).

Source: Salt Lake County