New Hanover County sharpening axe on budget

WILMINGTON – The best case scenario is pretty ugly. Those were the words of New Hanover County Manager Bruce Shell discussing options today at a budget work session.

The county is facing a $14 million budget shortfall, and commissioners are going to have to make some tough decisions.

A list of purely discretionary programs that New Hanover County funds every year totals $12 million for things like the food bank, the Senior Resource Center, Teen Court and the library. When commissioners looked to start trimming the fat off their budget, they started here.

“What I’m hearing also is that people just do not want to see a tax increase,” commissioner Bill Caster said.

Commission chair Jason Thompson looked through the list and said in light of the budget shortfall, there were only three things he was dead set on keeping: $187,000 for government television, $15,000 for a preventative wellness program that he says saves the county hundreds of thousands of dollars a year and $9,000 for roadside trash pick-up to keep our streets clean. He said he’d cut 12 percent across the board from the county libraries, parks, museum and cooperative extension office, and everything else could go.

“If we don’t have parks, libraries and museums, the quality of life of the community goes down, the reputation of the community at large goes down, and then people don’t want to relocate here,” Thompson said. “I can only provide what you the citizens will pay for, and if you tell me you don’t want to pay for anything else, that we have to cut it out, simple as that.”

Commissioners also eye-balled a list of services the county is mandated to provide, but funds at a level above and beyond what is required. If voters pass a sales tax increase in May, it would give commissioners a little more leeway to save programs and avoid a property tax increase, but they say it’s pretty clear, you can’t please everyone.

“Don’t complain about not having it if you’re not willing to pay for it,” commissioner Jonathan Barfield said. “Don’t complain about not being able to go to the park. Don’t complain about your children not having a nurse in school when they’re sick.”

Said Thompson, “Everybody emails me saying, ‘I want, I want, I want.’ But what they don’t want is to pay for it. So I’m trying to balance that out.”

Commissioners also want to extend the furloughs for county employees. They had hoped to do away with furloughs in the coming year, but in light of the budget shortfall, that no longer looks possible. Having county employees take two weeks of unpaid time off will save the county $3 million.

In another money saving move, commissioners plan to put off the tax revaluation planned for this year. While many home values in the county have dropped, commissioners say a revaluation will not do what the majority of people are hoping it will do: reduce their property taxes. That’s because revaluations are revenue neutral. While the assessed value of your home goes down, the tax rate goes up to compensate, so your tax bill is roughly the same. It costs half a million dollars to do a revaluation, and it’s an expense that commissioners feel they can put off until next year.

The county’s budget shortfall could put the brakes on two voter-approved projects. Cape Fear Community College had planned on beginning a $70 million project this summer using bond money to build the Union Station classroom building and parking deck. New Hanover County Parks and Recreation also had $12 million worth of bonded projects slated to begin. Rather than sell those bonds, commissioners want to put the projects on hold.

Opponents say now is the cheapest time to build and the county could end up paying more in the long run. Either way property owners will be expected to cover that debt with a property tax increase.

For a complete list of all the discretionary programs on the chopping block, you can log visit the county’s website at http://www.nhcgov.com/AgnAndDpt/BUDG/Pages/BudgetWorksessionsFY10-11.aspx. Click on the link for the March 24 work session.