Staffing and salaries are recommended to remain at current levels except for law enforcement covered by collective bargaining
Note: This is hot off the press, so no bones to pick at the moment. But speaking of the new $60 million county government center now under construction on Wonder World Dr. in San Marcos, we wouldn't mind asking who was it that proposed adding a workout facility to the building for employees, and how much is it costing the taxpayers? Seems a bit on the lavish spending side of the ledger.Send your comments and questions to roundup.editor@gmail.com, to County Judge Cobb (chief county budget officer) at bert.cobb@co.hays.tx.us, 512.393.2205, to County Auditor Bill Herzog at bherzog@co.hays.tx.us, 512.393.2283, or click on the "comments" at the bottom of the story
Press Release | Aug. 3, 2011
Contact: Laureen Chernow
Hays County Communications Specialist
laureen.chernow@co.hays.tx.us
Office: 512.393.2296
Hays County Courthouse, San Marcos, TX – At its Tuesday meeting, Hays County Judge Bert Cobb, M.D., presented his recommended FY2012 budget of $203,288,147, some $40.2 million less than the current FY2011 budget, to the Commissioners Court and the public.
Judge Cobb/RoundUp
The County’s fiscal year begins October 1, 2011, and by law the Commissioners Court must approve a budget and set the tax rate for the County by September 30.Among the judge’s budget recommendations are keeping staffing levels and salaries at the current level with the exception of law enforcement officers covered by collective bargaining, fully funding the new Government Center security personnel and operating expenses (a total of $1.1 million), keeping operating expenses at the FY2011 level unless reasonable justifications are made by office and department heads, and cutting social service organizations’ requests to 75 percent of their current funding except for libraries, which would be fully funded at their current levels.
Under his recommended budget, the effective tax rate would be $.4691 down from the current rate of $.4692.
The Commissioners Court will hold budget workshops to discuss the budget recommendations and suggest changes and reallocation of funding. The first two meetings are scheduled for Friday, August 5, at 2 p.m. and Monday, August 15, at 6 p.m. at the County Courthouse, 111 E. San Antonio Street, San Marcos. The public is cordially invited and encouraged to attend.
The FY2012 budget planning documents and proposed budget are available online. Printed copies for review are available in the County Clerk’s Office at 137 N. Guadalupe St. (Records Building) and in the Auditor’s Office at 111 E. San Antonio Street (County Courthouse), in San Marcos.
For questions about the budget, contact any member of the Commissioners Court or County Auditor Bill Herzog, 512-393-2283.
13 comments:
Way to go, Judge Cobb!
With an annual income of, what? $83 million per year...Hays County proposes spending $203 million?
So, if Hays County were a family that earned $83,000 per year, they would spend about $203,000. For how long?
I applaud Judge Cobb's efforts, but taxpayers can see we have a long DEBT ahead to come to grips with.
The County has no business spending that kind of money. Let's recall the previous group of commissioners raised county salaries during a fiscal crunch because they hired an analyst who said they could. We can't. The economy is dismal.
There still are more home foreclosures than ever before in the county's history. That has to tell you something re: the ridiculous amount of school taxes, bond issues and value creep going on.
Cut spending, cut county salaries until a time when the economy smoothes out. Better a cut salary than the loss of jobs, which may still happen.
Stop building and spending credit like we're in a good economic place. We're not and it's going to get a lot worse.
How can you cut taxes and increase spending? That is ridiculous current GOP mentality.
I'd really like to see some tax relief for Hays County residents, and most people I talk to agree that its in order. Renters, business owners... everybody pays it (unless the city and county cut an "economic development" deal with you and wave your penalties when you don't carry your end, but I digress).
It sounds like many or most municipalities are contemplating tax increases. I think Hays County can do better than a stable tax rate, and I'd really like to see our elected officials try in earnest. We could cut 20% from that budget and nobody would miss a thing, except for the special interest suits with their hands out.
I just don't run across people who feel under-taxed, and life is getting increasingly uncomfortable for a lot of folks.
Bob Marley told us, "A hungry mob is an angry mob." Let's stop taking people's money where we can avoid it, and there are a lot of places that we can avoid it.
One good start would be for our county elected officials to roll their own salaries back to 2007 levels. I think a pre-crash salary should suffice just fine in these tough economic times, since families are the ones paying for them.
Peter S. said... "How can you cut taxes and increase spending? That is ridiculous current GOP mentality."
We certainly don't need the Democrat model of raising taxes and increasing spending (Obamanomics) which is the reason that we have this national fiscal mess right now. Before someone says it, Bush was a big part of it as well.
Since most people in this country don't have skin in the game, meaning they don't even pay federal taxes they want more services and the selfish bastards really don't care what the fed tax is.
When it comes down to the local levels those freeloaders don't fare so well. They want more services but don't think they should have to pay for them; many don't. Since renters mistakenly think don't they pay for the County's follies they don't have a problem with "them" spending and borrowing us into bankruptcy. The Hays County property owners are stretched to the limit paying for these freeloader's hopes and changes.
Your statement, "Stop building and spending credit like we're in a good economic place" is part of the problem. You seem to imply that over spending is justified in good times but not in bad times. Are you serious?
Cutting taxes AND cutting spending is what we need.
Oh great, a new palace for our government officials to hob knob with the well heeled special interests while a lot of ordinary citizens struggle to keep up with their bills and mortgages and taxes. Something just doesn't look right with this picture.
Geez, Anonymous, I was saying that we should spend the money that we have on hand and NOT use credit to make purchases.
And both Democrats and Republicans use credit to make purchases, it's NOT just Obama-nomics. Bush and his cohorts did the same thing.
BTW cutting taxes AND cutting spending is helpful, but cutting taxes also reduces the money we have on hand. So, we need to be very careful when cutting taxes.
At the federal level, I don't think it's a good idea to cut taxes. Currently, most people are not paying their fair share and that is especially true of the very wealthy. So, at that level, we need to increase taxes moderately and drastically cut our expenditures --- especially the amount we send overseas.
We also do NOT need to be throwing away our tax dollars fighting wars that we shouldn't be fighting and/or those we can't win, e.g., Iraq, Afghanistan, various skirmishes in Africa, etc.
Can the public use the workout area in their public Justice Center?
Anonymous August 4, 2011 5:29 AM states:
"We certainly don't need the Democrat model of raising taxes and increasing spending (Obamanomics) which is the reason that we have this national fiscal mess right now."
This comment is pure nonsense and nothing but mindless GOP blather.
And any form of black or white thinking or analysis based on two narrow political mindsets is pure ignorance.
Over 80% of the current national fiscal mess is due to Republican Party economic policies. Giving tax cuts to the rich, cutting goverment and education budgets which will only increase unemployment and a deeper recessionary hole, and ignoring the huge taxpayer waste of foreign military expenditures just to appease the lobbyists for the military-industrial-energy complex is primarily a GOP and fanatically ignorant Tea Party extortion racket.
And citizens like Anonymous who continues to believe these lies spewed out by the GOP fear promoters needs to re-define reality.
And now sheep conservatives are all of a sudden blaming the Bush years for most of the past GOP big government spending - just to be against Obama - yet most of those same rubber stamp Republicans are still in Congress and now are all of a sudden against government spending because the Tea Party extortionists are making them flip flop from their Bush ways. BS again.
I can believe in raising taxes on the rich and investing in creating middle class jobs (which some Democrats espouse) much easier than cutting taxes for the rich and borrowing to go to war and increase the military budgets (Republicans) or cutting budgets indiscriminately and to hell with stimulating jobs and kick starting the growth of the US economy (Tea Party GOP).
You saw the 1000 point drop in the markets this week? Welcome to Tea Party / Republican Party (and now cowering Democrats) economic hostage negotiations.
Americans need to stop blaming the other side of their brainwashed political minds and start to think "problem-solving" and use whatever works best for the current situation.
Cut spending and cut taxes? Cut the spending yes and the next time the County wants to pass a bond say HELL NO. We here in Wimberley said that to the road bond but it got past anyway. We are now borrowing money to pay for next years budget. That's a Disaster wait to happen. Your taxes can only go up to pay for the things we really don't need and the pro growth people say bring'em on.Now we need water lines so we can have more people and more debt. Kick
To Anon, Aug. 7, 2:14 PM:
I agree to saying no to many bond elections. For example, I don't know whether we'll be "allowed" to vote on the revenue bonds to buy LCRA facilities, but if we are, and if the proposal isn't clearly worded that only the PRESENT LCRA water users would pay off the debt, then, yes, vote "Hell, no!"
Selling bonds (Borrowing money)will get more expensive:
S&P Cuts AAA Rating On Thousands Of Municipal Bonds
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 08/09/2011 07:17 -0400
The much awaited cut by S&P of thousands of municipal bonds following its August 5 downgrade of the US has arrived. Per Bloomberg: "The rating company assigned AA+ scores to securities in the $2.9 trillion municipal bond market including school- construction bonds in Irving, Texas; debt backed by a federal lease in Miami; and a bond series for multifamily housing in Oceanside, California. Olayinka Fadahunsi, an S&P spokesman, said he couldn’t provide a dollar figure on the affected debt. “It’s expected, but nobody is happy about it,” Bud Byrnes, chief executive officer of Encino, California-based RH Investment Corp., said in a telephone interview. “No one that I know thinks it was justified to cut the U.S. bonds to AA+. Once that happened, you knew that any prerefunded bonds or escrowed bonds would be downgraded too. It’s a domino effect.”" Well, Bud, if you really have so few acquaintances, we suggest you go out more. There are some fun bars on Ventura: give us a call for the low down. As for people who do go out more, here's one: "Chris Mier, a managing director at Loop Capital Markets LLC in Chicago who follows the municipal bond market, said the downgrades made sense, given the federal rating cut. “In order to keep the system logical and coherent, there are going to be a lot of downgrades,” Mier said in a conference call with reporters and clients." Matt Fabian, a managing director of Concord, Massachusetts- based Municipal Market Advisors, a financial research company, said in a telephone interview that he expected “hundreds and hundreds of municipal downgrades,” which may hurt investor confidence. “Treasuries may be able to shake off a real impact from the downgrade,” he said. “Munis, I’m less sure about." That's ok, while nobody has any idea what is coming, that won't stop 99.9% of those on Comcast's financial comedy channel from opining anyway.
More:
The company said on July 21 that a U.S. downgrade based on a failure to come up with a “realistic and credible” plan to reduce the budget deficit would be the “least disruptive” scenario for municipal ratings. That’s because it would mean Congress avoided making significant cuts to the funding of municipal credits not directly linked to the federal government, S&P said.
Top-rated state and local governments wouldn’t automatically lose their top scores, the company said. It rates the general-obligation debt of nine states AAA. The country’s “decentralized governmental structure” calls for an independent review of state and local government credits, 3.9 percent of which have AAA ratings, S&P said in a report.
State and municipal governments that depend less on the national government for revenue and that manage their own books well enough to weather declines in federal funding may retain AAA ratings, S&P said. The company didn’t name such states or municipal governments in the report.
Municipal issuance has fallen amid the U.S. debt-ceiling impasse. The slump and signs of a slowing economy helped drive tax-exempt yields to the lowest this year. Scheduled debt sales total about $2.8 billion this week, the slowest August week since 2003, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
For the municipal market, “the key is supply and demand,” more than ratings downgrades, said Ed Reinoso, chief executive officer of Castleton Partners in New York, which manages about $250 million for individuals.
The S&P action itself “was almost cosmetic,” he said in a telephone interview. “It doesn’t seem to have much impact.”
Sure, just like the Fukushima explosion had no impact on the lift expectancy of those surrounding it back in March. Perhaps we should all check back with population in the immediate vicinity in a few years... And then do the same for debt issuers in the US.
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