When traveling on business, it's custom for your company to pay for your expenses, and the same goes for city council. But  there's now specific rules in place for what gets charged.

Just like any other business, members of Youngstown city council attend conferences.  And when they travel, they pay for their expenses on city credit cards.

"Different things that are going on in government that we feel we should be attending, that's what they're used for," Youngstown City Councilwoman Carol Righetti said.

But now city council's approved a stricter policy for when the credit cards are used.  For example city credit cards cannot pay for gas for personal vehicles, members must rent cars with the most economic prices, and members cannot charge telephone-use fees to the credit cards.

"It helps cut down on wrong doing.  Not to accuse anyone of doing something wrong purposefully, but if you have the appropriate controls, fewer cards in circulation, it lessons that," Mayor Jay Williams said.

And one of the main reasons for this new policy is to provide some sort of checks and balances to city council.

"By tightening up the policies, we're showing to be good stewards of the public's funds," Mayor Williams said.

"So we could have a full exhibit on the books to show we have some teeth in the policy, so we as public officials have something to follow," Righetti said.

City council had the law department review the new credit card policy, and it now complies with rules and regulations statewide.