Last year’s county budget was $2,620,622.79. The estimated needs for this fiscal year is $4,870,813.97. Commissioners approved $2,039,910.07 for this year’s budget.
The county has overspent and the jail is sucking county accounts dry, county officials have said in the past. After over an hour of discussion between the commissioners and county officials, the county budget was tabled until the next commission meeting, which will be held at 9 a.m. Monday. Following the commission meeting, a meeting with the Sequoyah County Excise Board will be held on the preliminary budget.
Overspent
Sequoyah County Commissioners recently approved transferring $500,000 from their road funds to a county general government account when they were told the county overspent its budget by $284,850.49, with three months left in the current year.
Previously, County Treasurer Trica Yates and County Clerk Vicki Sawney said the debt was partially due to several maintenance and operation repairs, including $2,400 spent on the courthouse roof, and the replacement of air conditioning units at the county jail. The county recently faced a $40,000 insurance payment for property and liability insurance as well. That payment was taken from the commissioners’ personal services account, and was expected to be reimbursed.
Preliminary budget
Last year’s commissioners’ budget was $195,289.60. The estimate of needs for this year is $296,400, but what the commissioners approved was nothing.
The personal service budget for the county assessor’s office for last year was $53,133. This year’s preliminary budget left the assessor’s office with nothing. The commissioners approved a zero dollar budget. Donna Graham, county assessor, said the preliminary budget might change during Monday’s meeting. She said after the excise board looks at the budget they could also make changes.
The Sequoyah County Clerk’s Office took a significant budget cut for the 2009-10 fiscal year of $54,095. According to the preliminary budget the county clerk’s office took a cut of $46,895.68 for personal services — which includes payroll for county employees.
Last year the total budget approved for the county clerk was $180,318.68 and the estimate of needs — or what has been asked for during the 2009-10 fiscal year — is $213,713. The commissioners anticipated approval for the county clerk is $126,223.
“We may have to do away with health insurance for our employees,” Sawney said, fretting over the decision she may face.
“I hate to do it, I don’t want to lose it either. We just don’t know what we are going to do yet,” Sawney said.
Cindy Osborne, assistant secretary at the Sequoyah County Election Board, said that as of Tuesday, she has $23,058 to work with for the remainder of the year.
“That is enough to get through November,” Osborne said.
Cutting back
Sawney, just like the other county officials, is searching for ways to cut back and save money. Sawney said five people including her are in the county clerk’s office. She said she was already one employee short.
Several office’s are worried about not having enough money to make payroll for their employees.
“I’m going to cut my pay before I let anyone go,” Sawney said.
Sheriff, Jail problems
The Sequoyah County Sheriff’s budget has been cut from $500,414.03 to $308,967.42 for personal services. The total budget cut for the Sheriff’s Department is $216,446.61. Estimated needs stand at $847,909.20.
Lockhart said he has had to use $120,000 out of his personal services account to pay the jailer’s salaries. He said out of the Sheriff’s Service (cash) account he has spent over $50,000 to pay bills that the jail accrued before he took it over.
“I had to spend $3,150 for the 2008 audit,” Lockhart said
“I have $89,000 left in my personal service account to pay salaries until June 30.” Lockhart said. “The county was supposed to reimburse us by 10 percent. Our personal services are broke.”
Lockhart said he was informed that with the 10 percent budget cut from the county officials he would be receiving $210,000, but said he hasn’t received anything close to that.
Sawney said there was no money appropriated for the jail when the temporary appropriations where done in July.
We’ve put so much into it (the jail),” Sawney said. “We’ve already given the jail $46,415.00, which is part of the money from the 10 percent cut the officials took.
“That $46,415 was given to the sheriff to cover what we could. That’s all that we could spare. I know more is needed. We simply didn’t have it,” Sawney said.
“Just like the sheriff we have covered bills from the previous jail administration. We have paid outstanding bills and have been paying insurance since July 1.
“That jail takes a lot of money to run. If this tax passes it will be enough money to cover the jail and leave just enough to maintain the jail the way it needs to be maintained,” Sawney said.
Budget cuts = lay offs
“We are going to have to lay the jailers off,” Lockhart said. “We have 104 inmates right now and 114 beds. I’m going to get with the county commissioners and the judge to see if we can release some of our (Sequoyah County) inmates so we can bring in more Tulsa inmates.”
Lockhart explained that the $27 a day that each Tulsa County inmate brings in generates close to $30,000 a month. He said that money is being used to pay bills. He said if he made room for more Tulsa County inmates he might not have to lay off as many people.
“There will be no deputies on the street because apparently that is what some of the elected officials want. I’m going to have eight deputies up stairs running the jail and three on the streets,” Lockhart said.
He said the only reason why he would be keeping three deputies on the street is because they are still committed to the Shannon Southern homicide investigation.
“As soon as we finish that investigation, I’m putting the remaining three upstairs at the jail,” Lockhart said. “I’m going to be cooking for the inmates when we get to the bare minimum too.”
Cutting cost
Bruce Tabor, District 1 County Commissioner, said, “We may have to close the courthouse two to three days a week to keep it (the jail) open.”
Tabor said the county may have to go to self-insurance, which he did not want to do. He explained that a few lawsuits against the county, which could be won by plaintiffs, would force the commissioners to set up a sinking fund, which would increase ad valorem taxes.
The commissioners and elected officials are searching for any means to cut costs, he said. That includes cutting employees insurance, benefits and possible cutting back on the amount of days the courthouse is open.
The tax; possible relief
The proposed one–half cent jail sales tax, to be decided by voters in an Oct. 13 special election, appears to have pushed Sequoyah Countians to their tax breaking point. The tax rate would go from 9.417 percent to 9.917 percent in Sallisaw. The tax varies from rural areas and between cities and towns.
Sawney explained the one-half-cent sales tax.
Sawney said the ad valorem taxes will eventually go up if the tax is not passed. She said the county will not be able to pay the bills and vendors will file suit against the county. When the suits are filed the vendors will receive a judgment from the suit for the amount owed and that amount will go into a sinking fund, which is paid through the ad valorem taxes.
“The property owners in the city and the county will be supporting the jail,” Sawney said.
With the sales tax,” Sawney said, “the tax will be spread out over a wider area. People who come into the county to purchase items will pay the tax, not just Sequoyah County property owners.”
Sawney said 35 to 40 percent of the taxes are collect from people who don’t’ live in the county.
Sawney said this is not a scare tactic. She said she would be glad to share figures with anyone who wanted to come into the county clerk’s office.
What’s the difference?
“It won’t be a noticeable difference,” Sawney said. “But if it has to come out of the ad valorem taxes it will be noticeable to the property owners.
“With the 9.417 percent sales tax (in Sallisaw) we have now if a person was to spend $127 on items at Walmart the tax would make the total bill $138.95.”
She said with the increased one-half-cent tax the total bill would equal $139.59.
“That would be a 64-cent increase,” Sawney said.
jail history
The Sequoyah County Criminal Justice Authority took over operation of the jail when it opened 10 years ago, but the authority turned operations over to the sheriff earlier this year. The commissioners explained that by doing so, it allowed the county to use county money to operate the jail. The authority was only allowed to use a one-sixth of a cent sales tax already in place for the jail, rent money from the court system, which uses a portion of the jail building, and the few fees paid by prisoners.
The county only gets 0.91 percent of all the sales tax money collected in the county, which varies from urban to rural areas and from city to town. The county also gets a half-cent sales tax for county roads, but that money is dedicated only to the county roads, and cannot be used for the jail.
