UPDATE: Dec 1 at 11 p.m.
The Vance County Board of Commissioners voted unanimously to have Chair Carolyn Faines continue in the role for 2026. The board also elected newcomer Charisse Fain to the role of vice chair.
In making his motion to nominate Faines, Commissioner Tommy Hester told Faines she’d done an “outstanding job. I’d like to spend my last year with you as chair.”
Commissioner Leo Kelly seconded the motion.
Kelly nominated Fain to be vice chair. That motion was seconded by Hester and also was passed without objection.
After adopting the 2026 holiday, work session and meeting agendas, the commissioners heard from Vance County Sheriff Curtis Brame, who appeared before the board to express his concerns about the county vehicle acceptable use policy, which was approved in September.
Before Brame’s comments, Vance County Manager C. Renee Perry told the board that liability and risk are prime concerns for her.
She cited costs the county has incurred -$212,000 in jail repairs, $690,000 in emergency pay and an $80,000 increase in liability insurance due to concerns at the jail and with the Department of Social Services handling of child welfare cases.
The county implemented one cost-saving measure during spring budget deliberations – switching to leased vehicles, including vehicles destined for the sheriff’s office.
Those vehicles remain parked and unused, however, because the manager and the sheriff cannot agree on whether deputies should be allowed to transport their children to and from school.
Perry said she and Assistant County Manager Jeremy Jones had met with Brame, who expressed concerns about the new policy. “The only issue he had with the new policy was transport of family and children,” Perry said, adding that the sheriff said he would lose staff members if that one particular benefit was taken away.
“I guess I see the issue totally different than the sheriff. I don’t want any added liability for the county,” Perry said.
Brame said he was all for the county saving money, and agreed to the idea that sheriff’s office replacement vehicles be included in the lease agreement.
But his office hasn’t been able to replace the old vehicles with the new ones because of the impasse.
Brame said that six of his office’s current vehicles have more than 131,000 miles on them. “If we continue to operate those cars, they’re not going to be any good for resale,” Brame said, adding that they will be hazardous and dangerous.
“Holding on to new cars simply because the sheriff disagrees with the county manager, I think that’s wrong. I really do,” Brame said.
After close to half an hour of discussion and back and forth comments, Commissioner Dan Brummitt made a motion to allow deputies to continue to transport their children to and from school in their work vehicles. The motion failed for lack of a second.
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UPDATE: Dec 1 at 12 p.m.
Sheriff Curtis Brame is set to appear before the Vance County Board of Commissioners Monday to advocate for his deputies about the county’s proposed guidelines for use of county vehicles.
The county decided to stop purchasing vehicles and go with leasing vehicles during its most recent budget process, a cost-cutting move that Brame told WIZS he had no problem with. The main sticking point, however, is over wording in the county’s acceptable use policy that would curtail activities like deputies dropping off or picking up their children from school on their way to or from work in a patrol car.
“I’m agreeing to adopt some of their wording,” Brame told WIZS News. But he said the sheriff doesn’t have to comply with county policies. The sheriff’s office has its own policy that does allow employees to use their work vehicles for non-work activities like dropping children off at school, as well as other personal activities like stopping at the grocery store or driving a patrol car to church when the officer is on call.
“My argument is, I think they are over-stepping their authority,” he continued, by placing certain limitations on the sheriff’s office and its employees.
County Manager C. Renee Perry confirmed that the leased vehicles are being held until a decision is reached at the board of commissioners meeting.
Perry said she has no authority over the sheriff’s car policy, but she added that the leased vehicles are not in the sheriff’s budget.
“All leased vehicles are budgeted under the FY 25/26 budget. They are in central services budget, not the sheriff’s office budget,” Perry stated.
When county staff posed the question about having children or other family members riding in county vehicles would affect the county’s auto insurance, a senior underwriter for the County Risk Group responded that it isn’t recommended, “unless absolutely necessary.”
In an email response to county staff back in August, Ariele D’Angelo stated, “There is some added/risk exposure since if an accident occurs and is the county’s fault, then the county would be on the hook for injuries/deaths to the passengers.”
Brame addressed each of more than 40 points contained in the county’s acceptable use policy for vehicles and noted which ones he agreed with and which ones he did not agree with.
One such portion under Authorized Use states “All passengers accompanying County employees in County vehicles must have a business interest in the travel. Due to insurance limitations and regulations, no other passengers are permitted unless authorized by the County Manager. Any exceptions would require the employee and passenger to complete and have place in their personnel file a waiver of responsibility form.”
Another point Brame takes exception with is in the Driver Requirements portion, which reads: “Passengers who are not employees or authorized Departments of Offices in Vance County are not allowed to be transported in County vehicles except on official County business.”
From Brame’s perspective, seeing a patrol car in the school drop-off or pick-up lanes is a positive thing. Ditto for having a deputy pull into a grocery store parking lot to pick up items on the way home from work or drive a patrol car to church when on call.
“There’s too much down time,” Brame said, if a deputy gets a call and has to drive home to pick up the patrol car before heading to the scene.
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