Tuesday June 24th the Russell County Supervisors met and decided on the county’s physical budget for 25-26 year. Four supervisors voted yes so the new budget was adopted. The supervisors voting in favor of the proposed budget were David Eaton, Steve Breeding, Lou Ann Wallace, and Rebecca Dye. Three supervisors said no to the proposed budget. The three voting no were Andrew Hensley, Tara Dye, and Nate Kiser.
Three County News spoke with supervisors Andrew Hensley and Nate Kiser. Nate and Andrew both stated they could not vote for a budget when they could not get straight answers from County Administrator Lonzo Lester as to where some of the funds were located. Andrew continues to try to find ways to cut the approved tax rate.
The supervisors also were presented with a question as to whether to approve a $1,000 dollar bonus for all county employees. Chairman David Eaton said the money to cover the bonuses (around $60,000) came from the school board sending back unused funds to the county’s general fund. The bonus was approved.
The county still has some serious issues. One being the PSA and a proposed ordinance between the PSA and the county. It is still not clear from listening to the meeting whether the money collected for trash pickup placed on the PSA water bills is coming back to the county. As far as taxpayers would the money coming in from the PSA be an opportunity to drop the tax rate or just extra spending money for the supervisors?
It is great that three supervisors voted for the people. I am sure that there are places in the adopted budget where cuts could have been made.
The proposed budget which is the adopted budget is linked below for you to look at:
