Nye County won’t be getting a forensic audit.

A push for a forensic audit of Nye County’s finances met with failure this month, with a divided Nye County Commission voting 3-2 against moving forward with the proposal.

Put forward by commissioner Ian Bayne, the proposal called for contracting with an independent accounting or auditing firm to conduct a forensic audit of Nye County’s financial records, internal controls and general fund expenditures, special revenue funds, capital project funds and internal service funds, along with an audit of the county’s contract and procurement compliance and dedicated reviews of the Simkins Park Splash Pad and Pahrump Fairgrounds projects. Bayne had also selected acting Nye County Human Resources Director Capt. Harry Means to execute the contract.

As to the reason for the proposal, Bayne cited the multi-million-dollar general fund shortfall the county had to scramble to address earlier this year, as well as the controversy and questions surrounding the splash pad project and fairgrounds development.

“Today is a request to perform an audit that is completely independent of any staff member, an audit that takes an outside, private auditing firm that directly reports to commissioners,” Bayne explained, adding, “I see a forensic audit as a duty, not an option. And I think it’s long overdue.”

With Nye County still in a strained budgetary situation, there isn’t much wiggle room for additional spending but Bayne had highlighted a few options for funding a forensic audit. These included redirecting dollars that had been allocated for federal lobbying services, redirecting funds currently budgeted for Nevada Association of Counties (NACO) membership dues or utilizing some of the remaining Local Assistance and Tribal Consistency Fund grant dollars.

Commission chair Ron Boskovich said he would support the proposal so long as a few conditions were tacked on.

“I have no problem with a forensic audit, whatsoever - depending on the cost and where it’s funded from - with three conditions. One of those conditions is, if we’re going to audit things like that, then we need to take a deep-dive to look at, well, let’s say, commissioners. The background of commissioners, I think, should be public information,” Boskovich stated. “The second one would be… I would like an audit of how many complaints have been submitted to code compliance by each commissioner and what is the dollar amount of the man hours those have cost the taxpayers… And the third and final part, in order to gain my support of this, I want to know, for the last two years, what the management team – finance, county manager, assistant county manager – I want to know the cost-saving steps they’ve taken and what that’s saved taxpayers.”

“I’ve got no problem with that,” commissioner John Koenig remarked, while commissioner Debra Strickland added her own concurrence.

Commissioner Bruce Jabbour said he too found those conditions acceptable but he noted that any action to that effect would need to be taken under a separate agenda item.

Nye County Comptroller Zena Teich stepped in to center the discussion on the reality of funding. She explained that the audit of just the county’s financial statements for fiscal year 2025-2026 had cost around $300,000 and what Bayne had proposed would carry a far higher price tag.

“The way the scope is written up right now, it would be in the millions,” Teich stated before recommending the scope of the forensic audit be narrowed.

Bayne then made the motion, “First, to incorporate the first two pages of the addendum [backup information included with the agenda item] as instruction; two, to hear back from Capt. Means within 30 days at a public hearing on what decision he has made; three, to authorize Capt. Means to execute a contract for a forensic audit at any time he feels appropriate; and four, to fund $127,000 from LATCF with the option to reimburse from either NACO or federal lobbying, or anywhere else. The scope of the audit will be limited to the amount possible and will be decided at the discretion of Capt. Means.”

Jabbour offered a second for discussion, then asked for clarification on the authority being given to Means. “It would have to be an ‘up to’ amount and a one-time authorization,” Jabbour said. “Are you willing to amend for a one-time authorization?”

Bayne said that was the intent of the motion but when it came to a vote, only he and Jabbour were in favor. The motion failed 3-2 with Koenig, Strickland and Boskovich against.

“You incorporated none of what I demanded,” Boskovich asserted before moving on.

Contact reporter Robin Hebrock at rhebrock@pvtimes.com