Nevada County Picayune and Gurdon Times Newspaper Archive

Quorum Court passes budget for 2004 with no muss, no fuss

An amazing thing happened at the December meeting of the Nevada County Quorum Court  there was no mention of being short of funds for the proposed budget.

In fact, the court went through the budget quickly and approved it, giving all county employees a 3 percent raise for the coming year.

Bob Cummings, chairman of the budget committee, said there were a couple of major changes from last year.

One was the increase of almost $45,000 for the Nevada County Tax Collector's office. This is because the collector's office will be taking over some of the duties currently being done by Arkansas CAMA, the business hired to reassess all properties for taxation in the county. CAMA, Cummings said, is dropping part of what it does, but will continue focusing on reassessing property values as this is the more profitable part of its business. Because of CAMA eliminating the property appraisal portion of its business, the county must pick up the slack.

The funds allotted are for computers, programs and training. Once everything is in place, Cummings said, the county will be in compliance with the state and can be linked with the state's computers.

The $45,000, he said, is a one-time expenditure, but the county will have to spend $3,500 next year for programming and training.

The other major budget increase was $10,0000 for the Nevada County Tax Assessor's office, which will be used to purchase new computers. The state, he said, will reimburse the county $4,000 once the money has been spent.

According to Cummings, this will put this office in compliance with the state, and the assessor's office will have up-to-date programming, and will also be able to link up with state computers.

Cummings told the court the air conditioning system at the Nevada County Jail is in bad shape and needs to be replaced. However, the committee did not budget any funds for replacing the heating and air conditioning system. The court decided to appropriate the money after getting cost estimates on what the job will be.

Nevada County Judge James Roy Brown said he would get the estimated and bring the prices back to the court at its January meeting.

The court also decided to wait before passing a budget for the Prescott-Nevada County Library. Brown said the court would wait until the city appropriates funds and sees how much money the city gives before approving a library budget as was done last year.

Overall, the county's general fund's proposed budget will be $1.7 million, but only 90 percent can be appropriated. This will give the county $1,566,000 to operate on for 2004.

Brown said the court didn't have a definite figure on how much insurance rates would go up last year, but does this year, which helped the budgeting process. Insurance, retirement and the 3 percent raises were all factored into the budget.

Anticipated revenue for the road and bridge department is $1,680,608, with the county being able to appropriate 90 percent of this amount, which comes to $1,494,547.

The anticipated revenue for the solid waste department is $415,867. However, the solid waste department, Brown said, has a carryover of $40,000. He suggested this money be put in an interest bearing account for departmental emergencies.

It was also recommended, and approved, all county employees get a $50 Christmas bonus this year.

Janet McAdams, with the Nevada County Health Unit, asked the court for $650 to clean the floors at the NCHU building. The floors, she said, are supposed to be done every two years, but have only been done once since the building opened three years ago.

The NCHU, she said, spends about $300 a month on cleaning and janitorial supplies and has five bathrooms to keep up.

Brown said it looks as though there will be about $1,500 left from the election budget, and it could be moved in January.

Jon Chadwell, executive director of the Prescott-Nevada County Economic Development Office, updated the court on what's going on around the county.

The rural water project, he said, has covered 40 percent of the territory, but isn't 40 percent complete.

There have been a few complaints, he said, but the project will be a benefit to the county when it's completed.

Questions were raised about when the water would be turned on to customers. Brown said this would depend on when the booster stations and water tanks were built.

"We'll see if we can start it in stages," Chadwell said. "Customers will get water in the order the work was started. I don't know about the waiting period in between."

There could be a waiting period for some areas before they receive water, depending on how the construction goes.

"A lot depends on the weather," Brown said. "If it gets bad, they'll have to put the meters in first."

The sidewalk project, Chadwell said, is nearly finished, but it's unlikely it will be done by the projected completion date of Dec. 31.

He said the building in the industrial park should be finished by Dec. 22, and Prescott Rubber, Inc., will likely start operating in January.

"There's been a lot of prospect activity," he said. "In November, we showed the industrial park and armory twice and the garment factory once."

Companies, he said, are looking to make moves while the interest rates are still low, and this could benefit Prescott and Nevada County.

The bond rates for the street repair have dropped, Chadwell said, which means the issue can be paid off sooner and the tax removed from the books earlier than expected.