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Trumbull budget has small increase to cover health-care costs
Staff report
WARREN
Trumbull County commissioners are expected to approve a 2014 budget today of $43.8 million, which is about $500,000 more than the county spent in 2013.
The extra half-million will cover the county’s portion of the $1 million estimated increase in health care costs in 2014, said Adrian Biviano, Trumbull County auditor. Employees will absorb the other half million of the increase.
At this time last year, when commissioners approved a 2013 budget of $43.4 million, they were hoping 2013 would be the year revenue from the area’s oil and gas industry would begin to kick in.
Not only did that not happen, industry experts advise that additional oil and gas revenue may not come for four to five more years, Biviano said.
Sales-tax increases in the last two years have been from 2 percent to 4 percent, one reason the county’s financial reserves have dropped from $11.5 million in 2008 to $2.1 million now, Biviano said.
The county will pay the roughly $150,000 per year it will owe starting this year for the First Place Bank building on East Market Street out of the $2.1 million income-tax reserve fund, Biviano said.
That fund fluctuates from year to year partly based on the amount the county must pay to retire debt.
Commissioners also are expected to approve advertisement for bids for $1.8 million in senior citizen services for 2014-15. The services include ones in the homes of senior citizens, to protect them and to operate senior-citizen centers.
The amount to be distributed this year will be the same as last year, said Diane Drawl, who administers the program, which is funded through money from a 0.75-mill countywide levy first approved in 2005 and renewed in 2010.
Nearly all county employees remain on a wage freeze, though they still receive step increases. An arbiter and conciliator both ruled against employees of the sheriff’s office who sought a pay increase last year. The county is in negotiations this year with most of its employees.