County budget hearing next Monday

Wahkiakum county commissioners will hold their annual meeting to consider passage of their budgets for 2017.

State law mandates the meeting, including a public hearing, start on the first Monday of December. The meeting will start at 9:30 a.m.

Anticipating a year of tight revenue, commissioners last fall asked department heads to propose 2017 budgets with no increases over this year. For the most part, that theme carried through.

The Current Expense Fund budget, which covers most courthouse offices, is proposed to increase from $5.1 million in 2016 to $6.3 million in 2017.

The total for other budgets, which include the County Road Fund and reserves, is proposed to increase from $19.2 million in 2016 to $21.5 million in 2017.

To address the anticipated revenue shortfall, commissioners are tapping the County Road Levy to shift $482,000 to the Current Expense Fund.

Revenue from harvest of timber from state managed trust timberland should total around $1.1 million, up from $900,000 in 2016. Commissioners hope to pick up another $1 million through lobbying the legislature for compensation for trust timber land encumbered for endangered species habitat conservation.

The county faces a long-term challenge to generate sufficient revenues.

“I am looking at 2017 through 2019,” Commissioner Blair Brady said in an email this week. “We are and continue to strive for us to be sustainable for the long term. Should we not be able to resolve our timber issues by 2020, we will be facing an even more serious financial crisis than what currently exists. I believe we can and will achieve success in resolving our financial shortfalls.

“It is extremely problematic that our county staffs have and continue to bear the brunt of our economic difficulties. We are already beyond cutting any presumed fat and inefficiencies.

“We will prevail in our endeavours.”