Carbon holds the line on property taxes

Carbon County commissioners on Thursday approved a preliminary 2018 budget that would keep the property tax rate at 10.25 mills, the same as this year.

That means the owner of a property assessed at $50,000 would again pay $512.50 in county real estate taxes next year.

Commissioners expect to adopt a final budget next month.

The proposed total $56,309,505 budget balanced despite significant increases in courts and corrections and precarious assessed values.

“Property tax (revenues) are expected to be $54,145 less than last year,” Commissioners’ Chairman Wayne E. Nothstein said.

The budgets of the district attorney, adult probation, public defender, and sheriff’s offices all rose, said county financial consultant Jeff Weiss.

The budget for the district attorney’s office is expected to rise from about $918,000 this year to a projected $960,000 in 2018; the adult probation office from about $977,000 to $1,050,000; the public defender’s office from about $592,000 to about $657,000; and the sheriff’s department from $1.1 million to $1.25 million, Weiss said.

County Controller Robert Crampsie blamed the drug epidemic for driving those increases.

“When you look at where the costs are increasing, it’s courts, it’s corrections, the district attorney, the Clerk of Courts. It’s that hidden cost of that drug problem, how much it’s costing county governments,” he said.

Nothstein said the county coroner told him there have been 22 confirmed overdose deaths in the county so far this year.

He also cited recent increased security measures at county buildings.

The measures were necessary, said Commissioner William O’Gurek.

“The time has come when we have to make sure that we put this county in a position that we will be able to meet the needs of its people and its employees and its visitors for years to come,” he said.

O’Gurek said that after commissioners adopt a final spending plan, department heads and row officers will have to “make the commitment to live within the numbers in that budget.”

“This is a budget that really calls for cuts. Some of which weren’t cut by department heads or row office holders, that we had to cut,” he said.

A $600,000 shortfall this year was bridged by dipping into the contingency fund, Weiss said.

The gap was due in part to costs related to prison inmates’ medical expenses, including overtime for correctional officers who keep an eye on the inmates while they are in the hospital, O’Gurek said.

Commissioner Thomas J. Gerhard was absent.

Highlighting the revenue-side worries was commissioners’ reluctant approval Thursday of a property assessment appeal by Split Rock Country Club, Kidder Township. The appeal reduced the company’s 2015 and 2016 county property taxes on four parcels by a total $5,593.

The county has to refund that money. Earlier assessment reductions compound the problem.

“It’s going to be very difficult to make that up,” Nothstein said.

The total budget is divided into the $42,427,564 operating fund; the $11,090,784 capital projects fund, and the $2,791,157 special fund.

Nothstein said crafting the annual spending plan is difficult because officials can’t foresee unanticipated expenses, such as equipment failures, nor can they foresee budget changes on the federal and state levels.