At the beginning of March, Jim Taylor resigned from his post as Westmoreland County Administrator in the wake of a closed‑session performance review.

Before the closed session started, in a split‑decision vote, the Board of Supervisors elected to lay out for the public what led to the meeting as part of a commitment to transparency.

The County had, over the course of the last eight months, gone delinquent on not one, not two, but eight loans from Rural Development, which necessitated appropriating over $1.4 million to cover all the loans.

Taylor read a brief on the matter, stating that back in July of 2025, Rural Development took on a new accounting system and “as part of that transition, changed account transaction details used for automatic (pre‑authorized) drafts.”

Taylor indicated that Westmoreland was among several counties that experienced this hiccup and it was a problem at USDA’s end.

“The County first became aware of a potential issue in August 2025 when USDA notified County staff that while August payments were made successfully, the July 2025 payment was missing,” stated Taylor.

“Complicating this was a federal furlough period in 2025 that lasted about six weeks.

“Prior to the retirement of the former finance director in 2025, the former finance director and the Treasurer attempted to resolve the automatic draft and banking issue with USDA. The Treasurer reported attempting to call USDA for assistance; however, the calls were not answered and there was no ability to leave a message.

“USDA has stated that most communication on these issues was conducted by phone calls, which contributed to limited documentation or tracking during the period of intermittent contact and reduced staff availability.”

Taylor then stated that his office was only made aware of this around February 18, when a number of USDA/RDA accounts were considered delinquent due to repeated ACH rejections and eventual cancellation of the auto‑draft arrangements by USDA’s financial center.

“The USDA has advised that our financial institution no longer recognized the revised transaction details following USDA’s system change, resulting in rejected auto‑drafts and the eventual cancellation of the auto‑draft agreement,” Taylor continued. “USDA has indicated that the County cannot establish a new agreement until April 2026, and monthly payments must be made by check, at least temporarily.”

In short, Taylor stated that the situation came about due to changes on the USDA’s end that threw a spinner in the works of the automatic payments, which led to rejected drafts and cancellations. That was compounded by a government shutdown, but staff were coordinating with the USDA to catch up.

“Given the County’s recent experience with attempted financial scams, I worked with Davenport & Company to first validate the legitimacy of the issue and estimate the financial impact of the late payments. Davenport indicates the impact is relatively small. It also recommended confirming the expected payment amounts for the upcoming months after the catch‑up payment is processed.”

“Now, I’m trying to put the pieces together from the individuals in the room here with us,” Supervisor Darryl Fisher stated. “Apparently there was a change in the automated bank draft system that sent our payments over, yes?” he asked Bonnie Self, the County Treasurer.

“Correct,” Self replied. “When it was initially refinanced to get the lower rate, they had it set up where it would automatically come out, but the bank has to have the originator ID number as an approval list so that they know it’s not fraud.

“So when that notification is sent to the County, they would have to give that information to the bank, which I was not given.”

“So it looks like there was a breakdown in communications somewhere on the line?” queried Fisher. “A whole lot has taken place during the shutdown, and some things were impossible to get a handle on. I’m not trying to make excuses, just get a handle on the dilemma. We have the money; it just didn’t get to the right place, and that was a problem in our system.

“I want to sort out how we got here, and one thing we have never had trouble with before was dealing with our financial responsibilities through the treasury. I’m trying to get my head wrapped around it because for thirty years, I had the pleasure of working with Norm Risavi, one of the best financial minds I know. If something like this happens, a flag shoots up for me because it is not something that should happen, though I can understand how it can, due to the changes that took place.

“The County Administrator’s finance department had an individual in place with a verbal agreement, and the finance director left. The people that followed weren’t trained, and we had a perfect storm. I’m not making excuses, just trying to wrap my head around it. It’s the first time in my thirty‑three years that I’ve had to sit down and discuss a matter like this, and I hope I never have to see it brought up for another thirty‑three.”

Supervisor Matt Ingram was next to question Self.

“When the lender changes up how the money is routed, how long does it usually take to set up through our financial department and the bank that we deal with? How long does it take to set up at the bank?”

“When I reached out to them on Thursday, I had full financial documentation from the financial institution and had signed it with the new originator ID, so I’d like to say within twenty‑four hours,” replied Self.

“So what should have taken twenty‑four hours was dragged on for over seven months?” asked a stunned Ingram. “That’s what I’m trying to wrap my head around. There’s a clear breakdown in communications, processes, and systems.”

According to Chairman Tim Trivett, he received a message from Grace Atwell, the loan specialist for community loans at Rural Development, which gave a breakdown of the delinquent loans, detailing how it transpired.

“While the government was shut down for forty‑three days, that should not have impacted anything,” the Chairman noted. “She had been trying to get this resolved for quite some time, and Mr. Hynson requested I contact the former Finance Director. She advised me she had made the County Administrator aware of this immediately when it came to her attention, they were trying to resolve it in July, and she passed on the information in December.

“There were delinquent notices that went to groups like IDA as well. It should not have taken that long. They don’t charge penalties, but they do charge interest. While this happened with other counties, it was fixed right away within a grace period, and we didn’t.”

This eight months of interest is liable to be quite the pickle, according to Trivett’s correspondence with Atwell.

“I told Atwell that Davenport estimated the interest was around $5,000. She said she’d be very surprised if that was the case based on the interest that accumulated daily,” Trivett continued. “Once the payment is made, though, they’ll be able to notify us how much interest is due on the entire loan.”

“I’d like to note for the record that I did not become aware of this issue until about a week and a half ago,” replied Taylor. “The former Director of Finance told me she was trying to resolve this before she retired, and the Treasurer kept telling her that the problem was on USDA’s side, not the County’s. I can’t tell you why it wasn’t resolved sooner—I wish it was—but I just wanted to clarify for the record when I became aware of the issue.”

Afterward, the Board went into closed session. Taylor subsequently tendered his resignation days later.

Assistant County Administrator Donna Cogswell has taken up the mantle of Interim County Administrator. One week later, the Board worked on removing Taylor’s name from the County stationery and other formalities.

Trivett spoke on the matter before the Colonial Beach Town Council last week, during which he laid out how much interest it would actually cost the County, and it wasn’t pretty. According to correspondence between the Treasurer’s Office, Finance Department, and Administration, the accrued interest was in the neighborhood of $110,000.

“It’s sickening. Those are your tax dollars and mine,” Trivett stated during his update to the Colonial Beach Council. “The loans have now been paid and we are up to date. Hopefully it’ll never happen again. We owe it to you as the citizens and the Town government to help you, to be up front with you, to be honest with you, and to provide you information any way we can because we work for you. You as residents have an absolute right to know when things go wrong and what we’re doing to fix them.”