Budget Hearings - Day 1
I attended the Coos County budget meeting today in Coquille and wanted to share some of my notes.
Treasurer Megan Simms explained that each General Fund department was asked to prepare a budget with a 15% cut. The county is facing a roughly $5 million shortfall which they hope to patch by raising taxes through a "Public Safety" levy that is only supposed to be used for the jail and district attorney.
Proposed Cuts (if there is no tax increase):
County Counsel - Eliminate 1 Risk Management position
Board of Commissioners - Business Manager position reduced to 4 day workweek
Surveyor - Eliminate 1 Field Surveyor position
I.T. - Eliminate half of Director’s salary (to be paid by Coos Health & Wellness)
Maintenance - Eliminate 2 out of 2 Custodian positions
Assessor - Entire department reduced to 4 day workweek
Clerk - Eliminate 1 full time employee in Elections department
Treasurer - Eliminate 1 Finance Director position
More departments will present budgets tomorrow (Sheriff, District Attorney, etc.)
According to the Treasurer, each position eliminated would come at a one year cost of approximately $21,000 per full time employee. Based on the preliminary numbers above, that would total approximately $126,000 for 6 positions.
The county pays $6,240 per year to broadcast their Board of Commissioner meetings through PEG Broadcasting even though they are able to broadcast them to YouTube or Facebook for free.
The Forestry Department spoke about the “Private Forest Accord” which changed the rules for setbacks resulting in a 10-15% revenue loss due to shrinking of harvestable land. They also explained how there are less mills that are willing to purchase large trees because most modern mills are designed for smaller trees.
The Forestry Department was asked by Commissioner John Sweet to add $60,000 to their budget to pay for a code enforcement officer to hand out fines to property owners for code violations. They also asked for $52,000 to give to the Oregon State Police to respond to trespass, litter, and illegal burn issues (this money used to go to the Sheriff’s Office). In my opinion this money ($112,000 in total) should go to the Sheriff’s Office to fund the jail.
The Assessor’s Office has “change detection software” to determine if you have made improvements so that they can re-assess the value of your property and increase your tax bill.
Tomorrow's budget meeting will continue with the Sheriff and District Attorney proposed budgets, followed by the remaining county departments on Wednesday (Health/Wellness, Parks, Roads, etc).