County budget finalized

Hot Springs County Commissioners held a special meeting Monday to hold a public hearing regarding the budget for fiscal year 2016-2017, wherein the finalized budget was approved.

Chairman John Lumley opened the floor for public comment regarding the proposed budget for 2016-2017.

Vice-Chairman Tom Ryan said the treasurer handed him numbers with the total cash available at $5,067,875,520. He also commented that $10,000 was added for the soil conservation district. He said between those two changes, it brought the emergency expenditures to $114,508,029.

Commissioner Brad Basse said he thought it would be important to talk about significant changes made in this year’s budget concerning the hospital, the library and the fair versus historical budgets and the reasons for those changes.

“In previous years, those three entities were in what we call the top part of the budget, listing total cash available, total revenue and appropriations,” he said. “It was a very confusing way to do the budget for both the public and us. We had to make a lot more estimates.”

For example, Basse said the library would not include fines, interlibrary loans and postage and that got confusing to deal with. The other thing it did was it put those entities at a disadvantage in two ways.

“The first disadvantage being that any delinquent taxes would hit their budget,” he said. “It was about $7,900 last year for the library, whereas someone at the lower part of the budget, like the museum, it was just an appropriation. They didn’t take that hit, they just had a fixed number.”

Basse said the other issue was cash flow, which created a problem specifically at the library when they would not get funds dispersed, especially when no money came in.

“We moved them down to the bottom part of the budget, so they can fill out a voucher and the clerk would flow it through our normal bills,” he said. “It insulates them from the delinquent tax issue and provides them cash flow.”

Lumley then asked again for public comment and Joseph Casciato stepped forward.

Casciato said he read about Frank Robbins and the Set Free Church being refunded the $7,000 they donated to the county for jail renovations in the jail visitation area.

“I just find it hard to believe that a citizen and a church would donate money to the county for this, and I just thought it was unfair what happened to him,” he said. “I understand that you don’t control the sheriff’s department policy. I understand the law and what you guys do. You may not control that, but you do control the purse strings. I think it would be fitting for you commissioners to take the $7,000 that you’re going to give back to Frank and the church out of the sheriff’s department budget. That’s just my opinion. You are the commissioners and it’s your call. I think that would send a message. I just don’t think that was right, any way you look at it.”

Basse explained that the $3,467 for the current year budget for the jail visitation renovation came out of the $7,000. That will come out of the line item, which means giving Robbins and his church part of their own money back.

“The remainder of that went to modify the basement bathroom, to provide access to a bathroom to people visiting the jail,” he said. “It’s something that we didn’t realize until Frank and his group pointed it out to us. Normal Sunday visitation for family members because the way the courthouse is locked down, they didn’t have any access to the facilities. We made that bathroom available. That’s the difference from where that $5,000 and $3,467 came from. And we did work in the visitation area. We installed sound deadening panels on the ceiling and the walls.”

Ryan added the phones in the visitation area were also fixed.

Basse said it was not that the commissioners did not do anything.

“We had no knowledge that what we had done wasn’t accomplishing what they [Robbins and the Set Free Church] wanted,” Basse said.

Casciato said he was not putting fault on the commissioners.

“I think it would be a good message to the sheriff’s department that you control the purse strings,” he said. “I don’t know what you think about what happened, but it was not good. I think you should take whatever balance is left out of the sheriff’s budget.”

Ryan said he did not know Casciato had an issue with what the sheriff did.

“It’s his policy,” Ryan said. “I’m not faulting the sheriff in that regard. I’m sorry it wasn’t good enough for Frank and his church. They were disgruntled and we gave them their money back. I don’t think it falls on the sheriff.”

Lumley reiterated Ryan’s statement, saying that it is the policy of the current sheriff and the commissioners have no control over that.

Casciato said he understood, but he had to speak what was on his heart.

Lumley asked again if there were any further comments. As there were none, Basse made a motion to approve the budget with the modifications discussed.

County Coordinator Bill Gordon also attended Monday’s meeting to discuss a grant for the Big Horn Basin Healthcare Coalition.

Gordon said the Healthcare Coalition covers the four counties in the Big Horn Basin.

“They had some grant money remaining and they asked me to purchase five radios, which have yet to be programmed,” he said. “They will be kept in my office, but they will be available for emergency purposes if any hospitals in the Big Horn Basin should need them.”

The amount needed as a flow through item would be $13,223.70, which would need to be paid by Hot Springs County. The Healthcare Coalition would then repay the county immediately, Gordon said.

Ryan moved to approve the Big Horn Basin Healthcare Coalition grant request in the amount of $13,225. The motion was carried.

On Tuesday’s regularly scheduled meeting, commissioners approved the Black Mountain Road Funding in the amount of $275,000 for an engineering and planning study, followed by a motion for Chairman Lumley’s signature on the letter to WYDOT as well as authorizing the Chairman to design and manage the project.

Chairman Lumley also signed an archaeological agreement for Wyo-Ben Pit 109t, as well as approved a guardrail project in the amount of $9,090. Anthony Barnett explained that WYDOT had not yet done a walk through of the area.

There was a request for a groundwater monitor well plug that sits on county land. The want is to use extra money to plug the wells and fill them with bentonite chips. Ryan moved to sign the letter to plug the well, which was approved by the commissioners.

SRE Building drainage improvements and a letter of reallocation was reviewed by the commissioners. Basse said there were drainage issues and there was a request to transfer funds from the dispatch renovation to help with this.

Ryan made a motion to sign the letter about modifications from dispatch to the SRE Building. Commissioners approved.