The commissioners have given property taxpayers breaks in recent years, rolling back the entire $18.5 million property tax collection in 2022. This year they waived the estimated $6 million property tax windfall they could have collected as a result of the average 37% property value hike.
Commissioner T.C. Rogers said the tax break was warranted and doable this year but they have several very large capital projects underway and they don’t want to go back into debt — they completely erased all general fund debt in 2020 — to do them.
“We did it last time because it was going to be a shock and people weren’t going to be prepared for it, it did turn out for most of the residents not to be as much as they thought originally,” Rogers said and later added, “Why didn’t we do it this time? As you go over our budget amounts for the various departments and the obligations we have coming up this year, building those two new buildings and there’s several projects, it’s a matter of cash flow. So we did not chose to do it again, once you do it that doesn’t mean it continues in perpetuity”
Commissioner Don Dixon said they have had some hefty personnel costs to absorb so it wouldn’t have been prudent to reduce revenues again.
“We’ve had to readjust our budget and of course the county’s budget is 75 to 80% labor so we had to make some adjustments in there to stay competitive and meet our collective bargaining commitments,” he said. “It just made sense that since we gave it twice and there’s been enough time, everybody’s kind of over the sticker shock. It made sense to go back to where we need to focus on the total budget overall, so we can restrain any increases that may be coming our way.”
Credit: Nick Graham
Credit: Nick Graham
The commissioners have made a concerted effort — there was a time when double-digit increases and multiple raises a year were the norm — through the years to rein in personnel expenses. The county was facing serious financial issues during the recession until officials made some changes.
The county’s total payroll in 2008 was $136.6 million for 2,596 full-time workers, by 2010 the paychecks totaled $126 million for 2,289 employees. The auditor’s office told the Journal-News previously last year there were 1,932 full-time county employees who were paid $151.9 million in salary and benefits the full-time employee tally as of now is roughly 1,679. Personnel cost within the general fund are estimated at $84.3 million for next year, a $2.8 million increase over this year’s budget.
The commissioners and other office holders usually give annual raises — 3% was the recommended merit increase early in the budgeting process for next year — but in recent years the commissioners and other elected officials have had to depart from the norm to keep employees. The commissioners approved a second pay bump totaling around $220,000 for 71 non-union employees under their direct control two years ago, based on a market update by consultant Clemans Nelson.
The consultant gave them an update recently and the commissioners approved increasing the minimum pay ranges for all non-union employees and a 5% raise for those who are below the maximum for their pay range for next year.
County Administrator Judi Boyko told the Journal-News, “the economy has been volatile, and the national workforce has been tumultuous from the impacts and effects influenced by COVID” for the commissioners are attempting to equalize things.
“Over the last five years, inflation has impacted cost of living nearly 20% while the county’s pay for performance plan has provided high performing employees up to a maximum of 12%. For many county non-contract employees, wage treatments over the last five years have been substantially lower,” she said. “The board of commissioners recognizes the implications of COVID skewed the intent of the pay for performance plan and the county’s wages have not kept up with inflation.”
The commissioners for several years have operated with a two-part performance pay formula that calls for pay hikes in the 1% to 3% range added to an employee’s base pay which they refer to as part A and another 1% to 3% percent available in lump sum payments they call part B.
The commissioners set a 3% pool of money from a given department’s total payroll for eligible, non-union employees for the base increases and the lump sum incentive bonuses are worked into the regular department budgets. Dixon said they will return to that model in 2026.
The county is also renegotiating union contracts with seven of the 10 unions next year. Dixon said “we’re going to try bring them into parity so there’s no noticeable difference between the two, we always try to do that. I would think we should have any trouble at all settling those.”
There will be a 7% health insurance hike next year and the commissioners cover that cost for their employees.
Spending plan tops $507 million
The general fund is the main operational fund, but there are a number of entities that rely on outside resources such as state and federal funding, service fees like water and sewer and independent tax levies. All funds combined, the total spending plan for next year amounts to $507.4 million with revenues totaling $433 million.
For many years the commissioners have required a structurally balanced general fund budget, meaning planned operational spending matches recurring revenues and carryover isn’t required to pay bills. The special funding sources are fluid so those budgets can’t really be structurally balanced.
In addition to the $118.9 million cost to run the county operations that are supported by the general fund, Boyko also plugged nearly $90 million — about nine months worth of operating expenses — in reserve as a precaution.
Also built into the budget is the $16 million budget stabilization fund, $15 million for the capital reserve fund that is financing space reutilization projects, $6 million for capital projects, $5 million for a future project to upgrade the 911 telecommunications system, $4 million for the county engineer’s annual paving program and $1 million for a to-be-named American Rescue Plan Act project. That leaves a $25.6 million ending cash balance.
With the new cash infusion to the capital reserve fund there will be $45 million to implement the county’s space reutilization plan. The first phase is underway with the new joint facility for the coroner’s operation and sheriff dispatch center at the Princeton Road complex. The cost of that project is around $32 million.
Sales tax collections to increase
Boyko said this year sales tax — which amounts to about 40% of the general revenue budget — collections will be about $8.2 million more than they budgeted and investment income is also coming in around $8 million higher. However she said sales taxes appear to be leveling off at roughly $59 million, “we’ve almost plateaued so we are going to be watching that very carefully.”
Dixon said with all the extra they’ve had to spend in recent years, “We have to get a handle on ways to decrease our expenditures.”
“We did what we had to do and we’re in good shape I’m just saying we need to be very cautious moving forward,” he said. “We’re in great shape but I’m concerned about where we’re going in three, four, five years, we can’t continue on the increases we’ve experienced in the last three years without going upside down.”
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