Looming crisis hard to miss; County must act quickly

Looming crisis hard to miss; County must act quickly

Mahoning County government is facing a dilemma shared by many companies and by taxpayers: Income is falling, and decisions will have to be made regarding what the county can afford and what it must do to balance the budget.

As shown by two heavily detailed stories by staff writer Peter H. Milliken in Sunday’s Vindicator, some county officials recognize the severity of the situation and know that either jobs or salaries or both are going to have to be cut.

Some self-sustaining departments have already made layoffs — the engineer’s office, for instance — or cut pay — the health department, for instance, where managers were put on four-day weeks at proportionately lower pay.

Multiple factors

The county is being squeezed on every possible front. Sales tax revenues are down, property tax delinquencies are up, state support is being cut and investment income is lower because the county has less to invest and the yield on that which is invested has declined.

There are two reasons why every department in the county is going to have to make sacrifices. One, because by law they must balance their budgets. Two, because the county is going to have to go to the taxpayers no later than next year seeking renewal of half of its local sales tax. Unless taxpayers are convinced that county officials are spending money responsibly, the tax renewal could lose. That would put the county into a disastrous tailspin.

There is no time to spare.

Balancing the county books is a complicated matter because various elected officials have a certain degree of autonomy in running their departments. Wages, fringe benefits and working conditions for hundreds of workers are dictated by union contracts that would have to be renegotiated, and the unions must be given 30 days notices. Ohio Supreme Court decisions have given judges and the courts an enormous amount of latitude in demanding funding that meets their definition of necessary. And the jail is operating under a U.S. District Court ruling that prohibits what the court considers overcrowding or understaffing of the jail.

We have historically recognized the need for adequate funding of county operations and the necessity of protecting the county’s bond rating and overall fiscal health.

We have also criticized the courts for taking what we thought was unfair advantage of their power to dictate funding levels to commissioners. And we believe the commissioners have sometimes been too ready to provide pay raises because the money was available that day, without recognizing that it could be gone the next.

Starting at the top

The commissioners’ office is going to have to set an example of frugality and sacrifice, and commissioners and their administrator are going to have to then use their bully pulpit and their power to appropriate to bring other offices in line.

The shortfalls that are being projected make it clear that there are painful decisions that will have to be made, but the county should be able to maintain vital services if all work together.

Time is important because if personnel costs aren’t controlled early in the year, departments run the risk of having to make draconian cuts later. For every job that isn’t eliminated in April, two jobs would have to be eliminated in mid-August or three jobs would have to be cut in October to save the same amount. It is to everyone’s benefit to react to the fiscal realities of 2009 sooner rather than later.