BENTONVILLE -- Benton County's justices of the peace on Tuesday endorsed the 2018 budget.
The Committee of the Whole voted unanimously to send the budget on to the Quorum Court for approval. The Quorum Court is set to meet at 6 p.m. Dec. 21.
Joel Jones, justice of the peace for District 7, said the budget for the general and road funds is about $52.8 million. The county will have about $13.3 million in available reserve. The county will have about $518,000 in projected revenue remaining after approving raises for employees and elected officials; new personnel and some departmental reorganizations; capital requests; and the cost of opening new office space in Rogers.
The county plans to move the Election Commission and some County Clerk and Assessor offices to the new space in Rogers. Circuit Judge Doug Schrantz' courtroom and offices will be moved to a county building at 221 S. Main St. and some other county offices will be moved to new space. The county also plans to sell the building at 905 N.W. Eighth St. that now houses the planning and environmental offices.
The justices of the peace also agreed to use turnback money, money budgeted for 2017 but not spent, to cover expected costs in the health insurance program. The committee approved transferring money into the health fund, up to $500,000. The money will be transferred once all of the 2017 expenditures have been finalized. The committee also recommended Quorum Court approve moving $275,000 into the health fund immediately.
Jones said the county has received the report on its 2016 audit by the state Legislative Audit. Jones said the 2016 audit was clean, with no findings by the auditors.
In the 2015 report, the state found a former employee, Connie Guild, had stolen more than $1 million over several years. Guild, 52, of Gravette was a senior accounting specialist until she was fired in September 2016 and was the custodian of the travel fund.
Guild pleaded guilty in April to theft concerning programs that receive federal money and filing a false federal income tax return. She agreed to repay or forfeit assets amounting to $1,033,762 as part of her plea agreement. Guild was sentenced to 34 months in prison on each charge, to run concurrently. That will be followed by three years of supervised release on the theft charge and one year of supervised release on the tax charge.
The panel also recommended spending an additional $128,000 on a project to convert part of the juvenile detention facility into a youth shelter with room for eight beds.
NW News on 12/13/2017