DC Board reviews preliminary budget of $90.6 million for 2022
PROTECTED CONTENT
If you’re a current subscriber, log in below. If you would like to subscribe, please click the subscribe tab above.
Username and Password Help
Please enter your email and we will send you a password reset link.
By LeAnn R. Ralph
MENOMONIE — The Dunn County Board has reviewed a preliminary budget for 2022 of $90.6 million, representing an increase of $7.3 million over the adopted budget for 2021 of $83.3 million.
“It is going to be a difficult budget process. A $5 million hole is nothing to blow off,” said Paul Miller, county manager, at the Dunn County Board’s July 28 meeting.
“It’s going to take a lot of work from all of the supervisors (to end up with a balanced budget),” he said.
The preliminary budget reflects initial requests from all of the departments and is not a final budget, said Keith Strey, Dunn County’s chief financial officer.
The especially difficult aspect of the preliminary 2022 budget is that the county tax levy is projected to be $24.99 million, which is $2.7 million over the state-imposed revenue limit, he said.
The estimated Wisconsin Department of Revenue levy limit for Dunn County is $22.28 million, according to a budget summary Strey provided to the county board.
Strey said Dunn County will not receive the actual levy limit until sometime in August.
Local units of government have very limited options for raising additional revenue, Strey said.
One option would be for the county board to borrow more money to cover the parts of the budget that are not related to operations, he said.
Under state law, municipalities can take debt service outside of the levy limit so the debt service payments are not included in the levy limit. Municipalities can also take library funding outside of the levy limit.
One bit of good news is the Wisconsin Retirement System has announced a half percent decrease, which will result in a savings on the budget of $60,000, Strey said.
Health insurance and dental insurance are both out for bids now, and there may be hope for some savings there, too, he said, noting that a 10 percent increase had initially been projected for the health insurance.
Two percent has been added into the budget for employee compensation, Miller said.
Dunn County is currently conducting a compensation and class study to determine where Dunn County is compared to other competitors for employees, he said.
All employers are having difficulty attracting qualified employees, and the county may need to adjust the wage scale in order to attract and keep employees, Miller said.
The standing committees will review the budgets of the departments they oversee, and then those recommendations will go to the executive committee to pull together a balanced budget, he said.
“It is a daunting task,” Miller said.
The levy limit laws restrict the ability of the county to raise revenue to provide services for the residents of Dunn County that the residents value, he said.
Questions
One county board supervisor asked what was included under “other revenue sources?”
The category is a catch-all and includes grants, fees, refunds and matching funds, Strey said.
Tim Niehoff, county board supervisor from Menomonie, asked about the “external organizations” budget of $146,300, an amount that has doubled from the previous year.
External organizations refers to budget requests that come through the Community Resources and Tourism Committee and includes requests from the West Central Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission, the Dunn County Housing Authority and the Dunn County Economic Development Corporation, Strey said.
Much of the increase in the external organizations budget item is due to the request from the Dunn County Economic Development Corporation, he said.
In previous years, other organizations would have made budget requests as well, such as the Mabel Tainter Memorial Theater and Stepping Stones of Dunn County, but as budgets have grown tighter in recent years, those appropriations have been scaled back, Strey said.
Niehoff also asked about the almost $1 million increase for workers’ compensation.
The increase reflects a transfer of $1 million from the workers’ compensation fund to the health insurance fund. There were excess funds in the workers’ compensation fund because Dunn County has had few claims, Strey said, noting that Dunn County is self-funded for workers’ compensation.
Niehoff asked, too, about the $25,978 included the district attorney’s budget for “compensated absences payout” for a legal secretary.
Compensated absences payout refers to sick leave and vacation time that has accumulated for an employee who has not taken sick leave and has not gone on vacation. Under the employee handbook, when someone retires, the amount banked is paid out. The department responsible for that employee pays what has accumulated for compensated absences, Strey said.
James Anderson, county board supervisor from Menomonie, asked about the amount that would be coming in after a full year of the $20 vehicle registration fee being collected.
The amount will be about $700,000 and will be included as other revenue sources under the highway department’s budget, Strey said.
The Dunn County Board will be holding a budget workshop on August 11.
Budget requests
Nearly 70 percent of the preliminary budget for 2022 can be attributed to five budget areas — sheriff’s department, human services, The Neighbors of Dunn County, highway and health insurance.
Here are some of the requested expenditure totals by department for 2022:
• Administration: $5.8 million.
• Circuit Court: $1.7 million.
• District attorney: $661,885.
• Emergency communications: $1.6 million.
• Environmental services: $2.4 million.
• Fair board: $219,173.
• Libraries: $801,786.
• Medical examiner: $631,046.
• Public health: $1.5 million.
• Public works department — facilities: $1.6 million.
• Public works department — parks: $82,850.
• Sheriff’s department: $7.5 million.
• UW-Extension: $254,805.
• Human services: $14.07 million.
• The Neighbors of Dunn County (89.5 percent occupancy): $14.7 million.
• Public works — highway: $15.2 million.
• Health insurance — $10.7 million.
