BENTONVILLE -- Benton County's justices of the peace say they are still in the information-gathering stage of developing the county's 2017 budget.
The Budget Committee will hold it third formal budget meeting at 5 p.m. today.
What’s next
Benton County’s budget process resumes today when the Budget Committee meets at 5 p.m. The Personnel Committee is set to meet at 6 p.m. Tuesday to review 2017 personnel requests. Both meetings will be in the Quorum Courtroom at the County Administration Building, 215 E. Central Ave. in Bentonville.
Brenda Guenther, county comptroller, said she will present the justices of the peace with more concrete figures on projected revenue. The deadline for paying property taxes was Oct. 17. Guenther said the Collector's Office is working on a new report on expected property tax revenue.
Also today, Guenther said, the committee will review the Road Department's proposed 2017 budget, including about $3 million in capital equipment requests. The panel also will review the proposed budget for the Election Commission, which includes a request to set aside money that could be used to buy new voting machines and related equipment if the state gives its approval.
Pat Adams, justice of the peace, said the Transportation Committee reviewed the Road Department's capital requests list and he's satisfied with the department's $3 million in requests.
"All in all, it looks manageable," Adams said. "The rotation plan for the road graders is still in place. The road plan for next year is more repair and maintenance. We've neglected some of that in recent years. Most of the capital is going toward what they need to do the maintenance. With the total being about $3 million, that's close to what they got last year. I'm trying to get them to keep their capital requests to where they're consistent, so they're not going to ask for $5 million one year and $2 million the next year. I think they can get it to about $3 million a year so we don't get that gigantic wish list. We get the actual needs list."
Justice of the Peace Barry Moehring faces Ronnie L. Smith and Jeff Broadston in the race for county judge in the Nov. 8 general election. Moehring said the county's 2017 budget process is running true to past years.
"It's still early and we still have a lot of work to do on the budget," Moehring said. "One thing we do know is that the demand for budget expenses exceeds the supply of budget revenue. As a Quorum Court, we're going to have to go back and carefully review all of those requests. There's not going to be enough money for all of them."
Susan Anglin, justice of the peace, agreed with Moehring the demands on the county's revenue will exceed even the best revenue estimates.
"We've got wages and new personnel and all the needs we have on the capital side like the repairs to the jail. Some of those things can't wait. We're going to have to be looking seriously at prioritizing. In the end, we're going to have to make some hard decisions," Anglin said.
NW News on 10/24/2016