The county is considering changes to how departments go about making purchases between $100 and $500.

The Troup County Board of Commissioners considered updates to the county’s purchasing ordinance during its regular meeting on Tuesday. The updates seek to simplify the process for departments to purchase items less than $500 by making it possible for departments to make those purchases without Purchase Orders. The current threshold is $100.

“We want to raise the purchase order threshold from $100 to $500,” Finance Officer Buddy Cashwell said. “It will make it a lot more efficient and help reduce some of our purchase orders.”

During 2016, 2,600 purchase orders or 59.1 percent of all purchase orders for the county were for amounts less than $500. The total cost of those orders was $608,514 or 6.9 percent of the total cost of purchase orders.

Many surrounding cities and counties have higher thresholds for purchase orders, though some concerns were expressed at the loss of oversite on those purchases.

The Troup County Board of Commissioners plans to further discuss changes to the purchasing ordinance during its work session on Sept. 14 at 9 a.m. at 100 Ridley Ave.