Tough decisions ahead

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Tough decisions ahead

Opinions

Thursday, 18 February 2010 00:38

Elected county officials will face some tough decisions in the coming months over how to deal with another significant drop in property tax revenue – this time the drop could be as bad as 20 percent to 25 percent.
Osceola County commissioners Friday at their retreat heard that they could see from $27.4 million and $34.3 million less money to work with for the 2010-11 fiscal year budget, and that is just in the general fund.
Most everything that isn’t required by statute could be on the chopping block: subsidies to organizations that offer social services or put on events, funding for a regional economic development group and Osceola County Health Department programs.
In addition to lower general fund revenue, the emergency medical service fund, the library fund and the SAVE Osceola fund could see similar percentage drops.
One move we recommend would be for the county to not buy down any fire assessment fees for certain groups of property owners. The county last year spent $4.1 million from the general fund for this purpose, and it was a giveaway to special interest groups.
We also have to quit subsidizing funds that are not carrying their own weight, such as the transportation fund, which had a $9.4 million subsidy in the current budget. We might not like the idea, but we may have to raise the gas tax by 5 cents per gallon, as proposed previously. That would generate $6.6 million for this fund. Diesel fuel (used predominantly by commercial vehicles) would be exempt from the tax and tourists would bear some of the cost.
We also agree with the recommendation that we take $10 million from the county’s unrestricted reserves and use it for capital projects. That would lower the reserve to 20 percent of the county’s annual operating costs.
However, we don’t think an across-the-board 5 percent salary cut for county employees – including those at the constitutional offices – would be fair. The cut should be tiered, with 5 percent or more for the top wage earners, a lesser cut for those at the bottom. That would make having to pay for family health coverage, as proposed, a bit more palatable for lower-level employees.
All the cuts proposed so far might not be enough. We may still face shuttered libraries and fire stations and padlocked parks.