When, in the course of the work of the department of transportation, the commissioner of transportation finds it necessary to make payments of salaries or personal expenses, or both, now authorized by law to the personnel of the department, in all cases except where an appropriation for salaries and expenses and/or wages is made by the general appropriations act, the commissioner shall prepare in duplicate payrolls and/or expense accounts, showing in detail the payments due to each and every employee of the department, properly itemizing all expense accounts, which payrolls and expense accounts may be in one (1) document or in several, at the discretion of the commissioner. The original of the payrolls shall be filed in the department and a duplicate copy of the payrolls shall be certified by the commissioner as being correct, and the commissioner shall then draw a voucher-warrant for the total amount of the payroll or payrolls, and the voucher-warrant, when found to be correct by the commissioner of finance and administration, shall be signed by the commissioner of finance and administration. Upon presentation of the voucher-warrant to the state treasurer, it shall be the state treasurer's duty to pay the voucher-warrant and to deposit the proceeds of the voucher-warrant into a state depository the state treasurer selects, the voucher-warrant to be deposited to the credit of the commissioner of transportation, payroll account. The commissioner of transportation may then draw checks payable to the order of the respective parties to whom the salaries, wages and/or expenses may be due for the amounts due each. The payrolls, when in possession of the state depository designated by the state treasurer, shall be protected by the regular depository bond. All checks drawn by the commissioner of transportation on the payroll account shall be segregated month by month and preserved for a period of twelve (12) months and, at the expiration of the twelve-month period, the commissioner of transportation may transfer the checks to the archives of the state.