If a county does not meet the 425,000 population threshold, are there other actions a board of county commissioners may take to consolidate functions of local agencies?

There are aspects of operation and administration that are not addressed specifically by laws and that are within local officials’ discretion to manage. For example, a county health department may: 

• share administrative staff with a different county agency, such as the department of social services;
• consolidate administrative functions such as finance or human resources in a single office housed in county operations rather than in one of the departments;
• co-locate its public health and social services agencies and possibly share front desk and intake operations;
• have an agreement in place with a neighboring county for provision of one or more specific services; or
• have a direct contract in place with staff from a neighboring county for provision of services in off-hours.

This is not an exhaustive list – a county may well be able to identify additional actions that it could take, despite not reaching the population threshold for full consolidation.