PORT ANGELES — Clallam County commissioners, facing a projected $1.8 million county deficit next year, asked staff Tuesday to return with a balanced budget before they consider department requests.
The county’s 2018 preliminary roll-up budget was presented during the meeting Tuesday, and the current iteration shows the county using $1.8 million in general fund reserves to balance its budget.
It’s early in the process and the current proposed budget assumes the county maintains the status quo, county officials said; it doesn’t account for additional revenues or expenses.
Commissioner Mark Ozias stressed that this early in the budget season, it’s typical for the budget to show a deficit.
“The shape of the budget as presented is not out of the ordinary,” he said.
What is unusual is for the commissioners to direct staff to come up with a balanced budget this early in the season, County Administrator Jim Jones said.
“I appreciated that they gave the direction today instead of waiting until late October or November,” he said.
Jones said five of the 11 budgets he’s developed for the county have had positive cash flow.
The projected $1.8 million deficit is likely off by about $800,000, he said, meaning the county should use only about $1 million in reserves. He estimated an additional $500,000 in revenue and $300,000 less in expenses than what was previously thought.
He sent an email to department heads Tuesday asking them to look for potential cuts that could add up to the $1 million.
In the meantime, department heads are asking the commissioners for $1.95 million in new funding from the general fund.
Of the requests, about $1.4 million would be one-time costs, while about $550,000 would be ongoing costs.
Commissioners asked Jones to present a budget that brings the general fund’s reserves up to $9 million.
The preliminary budget projects reserves dropping to $7.7 million, but after adjusting for the $800,000, he said the county only needs $500,000 to hit the $9 million mark.
Jones said staff will meet with department heads by the end of this month and come up with a recommended budget.
The commissioners will then meet with department heads before developing the final budget.
Code enforcement
Among the requests they’ll hear is a request from the Department of Community Development for code enforcement staffing.
The DCD is asking for about $126,000 to pay for an administrative assistant and another code enforcement officer. If approved, that would triple the DCD’s code enforcement staff.
The county currently has one lone code enforcement officer who recently told commissioners she had a backlog of 200 cases. She works with other departments on some cases.
Commissioner Randy Johnson suggested Tuesday that as the county works on balancing its budget, he’ll look for ways to fund code enforcement.
“Code enforcement [funding] may have to come out of something else, I hate to say that,” Johnson said. “We need to have that discussion.”
Jones said it’s far from a done deal and that funding needs to come from somewhere.
“One of the things I’ve discovered in public life … is that there’s always more good legitimate things to spend money on than money to spend,” Jones said, using code enforcement as an example. He said public safety has been a priority over code enforcement.
Mary Ellen Winborn, director of the DCD, said Tuesday she is optimistic that commissioners will find a way to bolster code enforcement efforts during this budgeting cycle.
She said she’ll likely present three options, ranging from the request for two staff members to a “bare minimum” request. She said the county needs to hire at least one more person — even a part-time position — to help the code enforcement officer.
“We need somebody to help [her],” she said. “She just can’t do it all by herself.”
Commissioners have suggested a shift in policy to help with code enforcement, but Winborn said the priority should be in hiring another person.
“Policy is not going to remove open sewage from the ground,” she said. “Maybe later policy will help, but right now we have tangible issues that can only be dealt with with feet on the ground.”
Commissioner Bill Peach said that if after the budget is balanced department heads feel there were too many cuts, “at least we’re working off a zero base.”
Ozias said the longer-term goal should be to build the reserves up to about $10 million but that it’s unrealistic for this year.
“If I look ahead three years, that would be a target,” he said.
Jones said staff would come back to the commissioners with “a couple of ways to achieve the savings.”
“I don’t want to start recommending we lay off people when we’re too heavily conservative with the budget,” he said.
He told commissioners there’s still plenty of work to be done on the budget and “we’ll figure out a way to do this.”
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Reporter Jesse Major can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 56250, or at jmajor@peninsuladailynews.com.
