Darlington County Council took just 10 minutes to hold public hearings on eight ordinances for a $32.5 million budget package for fiscal 2010 and give the measures final approval.
Monday’s special called meeting for third and final reading was necessary because of delays in the budget process this year and because county officials had insufficient time to advertise the budget’s revenue and expenditure figures well enough in advance of council’s June 15 meeting.
No one spoke during the public hearings on the ordinances. Council passed the ordinances without opposition and with no discussion.
The budget package includes no property tax increase, something that pleased most council members when they first saw the budget.
The $24.8 million general fund budget, the largest of the budgets, saw revenue for the coming year reduced by more than $1.1 million, County Administrator Phyllis Griffitts told council when she presented the budget proposal in May. Of that, $991,910 came in the form of a cut by the state in funding to the county, she said.
The state also cut $66,500 in state aid to public libraries and another $19,000 in state lottery funds for libraries, according to Griffitts. The new library budget amounts to more than $2.3 million.
The budget package also includes an environmental services budget of more than $2.6 million, a Darlington County Fire District budget of more than $1.2 million, a Darlington County Economic Development Partnership budget of slightly more than $1 million and an emergency telephone services budget of $385,000.
Of the total budget expenditures in the package, wages and salaries account for more than $17.2 million, about 53.15 percent of the budget’s total expenditures.
Operations account for almost $9.6 million, about 29.58 percent, grants almost $3.8 million, or 11.57 percent, and capital expenditures more than $1.8 million, or 5.7 percent.
The budget contains little funding for capital projects and no funding for employee pay increases.
Many of the decreases in budget requests needed to balance the budget and avoid a tax increase came in some operational and some capital fund accounts and some accounts for grant matches, Griffitts said.
The budget does not eliminate any county employee positions, nor does it rely on employee furloughs, Griffitts said.
The largest portion of the general fund budget, almost $10.4 million, goes toward judicial and law enforcement needs, accounting for about 41.7 percent of the $24.8 million general fund total.
Another 12.8 percent, or $3.2 million, goes to other departments, while $11.8 percent, or more than $2.9 million, goes for acquiring grants. Emergency Medical Services and Emergency Preparedness Agency expenditures account for 10.3 percent of the general fund total, or more than $2.5 million. More than $1.7 million, just more than 7 percent, goes to roads and bridges, with 5.5 percent, more than $1.3 million, going to tax offices, and 3.7 percent, or $920,590, going to central communications.
Another $788,520, 3.17 percent, is budgeted for building maintenance and janitorial services. Expenditures for parks and recreation make up about 2 percent of the general fund total at almost $500,000. And expenditures for such public safety items as codes enforcement, mosquito control and animal control total about $465,000, or about 1.87 percent of the general fund.
“This has been a challenging budget year due to state cuts,” Griffitts said in her annual budget message to council on May 19.
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