More cuts coming for Lincoln County

Lincoln County commissioners are looking at making a five percent cut to several county departments, as the 2014-15 budget talks continue this week

Following the latest budget meeting on Tuesday, and the weekly commissioners’ meeting on Wednesday, Eureka commissioner Mike Cole said they were looking a possible “percentage scenarios” to attack the budget.

“In a perfect world it would be across all departments, but for some (departments) that is not possible,” Cole said. This was because several departments already had their budgets reduced, Cole explained.

The Sheriff’s Office was the first confirmed cut earlier this month, as budget discussions began.

As many as two deputy positions have been made redundant, because of the $200,000 cut, both the county commissioners and the Sheriff’s Office confirmed earlier this month.

Cole said all departments had submitted their budgets this last week, and the commissioners were continuing to look at any feasible way to shave costs.

“We’ll just keep hammering on the numbers and seeing how close we can come,” Cole said.

Last week, The Western News reported that  Cole and Libby’s commissioner, Tony Berget, had taken the county’s problems to Washington D.C. and Denver, with graphs that illustrated the dire straits the county faced.

This included the likely loss of federal Secure Rural Schools revenue, which had dropped from $4 million in 2009 to $2,867,586 in 2013. The county has also seen a drop in investment earnings from $1,156,415 in 2008 to $143,348 in 2013. Alongside this, the commissioners had a graph that pointed to the decline of the timber harvest values in Lincoln County, which has gone from $4.5 million in 1994 to just over $329,000 in 2013.

While the Secure Rural Schools money had always come in last minute, Berget said last week that commissioners needed to work on the budget as if the county was not going to receive the federal funding.

On Wednesday, Berget said that no Secure Rural Schools money has come in so far.

The commissioners had been looking at having a percentage of cuts that each department would have to apply to their individual budget.

“We’ve talked about eight, we’ve talked about 12, we’ve talked about all kind of cuts,” Berget said, but added that the commissioners were now talking about a 5 percent cut across some, but not all, county departments.

Some departments, such as the weeds department, could not be cut any further, Berget said.

If the road department were to be cut by 5 percent it would be less likely to affect personnel, Berget added.

“When you make cuts to some departments, it’s going to have more of an effect on staffing,” he said. “With the sheriff’s department it is tough because there are a lot of individuals. In the road department most of (the road budget) goes towards road services, as well as oil and gravel ... we don’t want to see anybody laid off.”

With the loss of investment earnings and uncertainty regarding Suecure Rural Schools money, the commissioners were looking at every option available.

Last year the budget was approved at $15.419 million. Berget said it was still “a moving target” on the exact amount that needed to go, but he estimated it was about $750,000. 

Since 2012/13, the commissioners had made cuts that amounted to about $2 million, Berget said. 

The 2014-15 budget will be finalized in late August, Berget said.