Butler County commissioners will hold a budget hearing at 9:30 a.m. Friday at the courthouse to review planned spending for 2019.
The budget must be approved by the end of January.
It will include a 2 percent cost-of-living increase for employees, according to presiding commissioner Vince Lampe. The increase will be applied across the board, Lampe said. A 2 percent cost-of-living increase in 2018 was distributed at office holders’ discretion.
“Since I’ve been here, all of the elected officials have worked hard to save money. That’s another reason the 2 percent (increase) is needed, because their workers did that too,” he said.
Figures for the 2019 budget have not been released, but the county ended the last fiscal year with increases in cash balances for most funds despite a slight decrease in sales tax revenues.
The general fund cash reserve increased by just over $265,000, to $1.79 million as of Dec. 31.
Total sales tax collections were down about $18,000, at $6.9 million for 2018. Sales tax is the largest single source of income for the county.
Budgets for most office holders are expected to be at or under spending in 2018, Lampe said earlier this week, as the county was finalizing figures.
The general fund cash reserve includes an emergency fund of $450,000, equal to 3 percent of the $23.3 million in spending in 2018.
Emergency funds were not needed, said county clerk Tonyi Deffendall.
“All other (2018) budgets came in under budget,” Deffendall added.
Three funds that pave and repair roads and bridges saw increases in cash reserves as well, of between 20-45 percent.
Road and bridge jumped by more than 40 percent, to $2.27 million. It includes about $40,000 in insurance money for a pole barn that was damaged by fire in the fall. The county also received the last of Federal Emergency Management Agency money from the 2017 flood, Deffendall said.
Eastern and western district cash reserves are now $658,300 and $594,700 respectively.
Cash on hand for all county accounts was up 20 percent by the end of 2018, at just over $8 million.
The fund that covers expenses for the sheriff’s department saw a decrease in cash of nearly 50 percent, or almost $200,000. The department had a cash reserve of $218,700 as of Dec. 31.
Sheriff Mark Dobbs has said reserves will continue to be needed in 2019 to bolster budget shortfalls under $3.4 million of planned spending. While sales tax income has remained flat, expenses such as feeding prisoners and equipment replacement continue to go up, he said.