Column

Officials cut on one end, hurt on the other

By C.T. BOWEN, Editor of Editorials
Published September 2, 2007

Wednesday morning, former social worker Ann Hildebrand will gather with community movers and shakers for breakfast at a private lodge in Land O'Lakes to kick off a $1.6-million fundraising campaign for United Way charities.

After lunch, she'll return to her current job and sit atop an elevated dais with four other people and consider cutting public funding for those same social agencies.

These are the conflicts commissioners must confront as they continue to whittle $15.8-million from the proposed 2008 county budget to meet the state-mandated 3 percent reduction in the property tax rate.

In both tasks, Hildebrand will have the gavel. She is chairman of the county commission and agreed this year to serve as chairman of the United Way.

"Did you ever think we'd end up in this situation?" Hildebrand asks of the budget dispute.

While Sheriff Bob White's proposed spending has been the focus of most of the cutting - to be expected since his office accounts for 55 percent of the property tax in the county's general fund each year - there are other accounts to be scrutinized.

Hildebrand worries about the $381,000, equal to a $1 per resident in unincorporated Pasco, the commission provided to the United Way charity groups in the current budget.

Amid uncertain economic times and increasing foreclosures, the demand for social services will increase, she says. (It's a familiar lament. The sheriff made the same observation about deputies handling more domestic disturbances as household finances worsen.)

Commissioner Ted Schrader already suggested halving the formula to 50 cents per resident. Hildebrand is hopeful the amount could at least stay at $300,000, the appropriation approved in 2005. Commissioner Pat Mulieri thinks outside charity dollars can go if the county can't even afford the now delayed expansion of its mass transit service to Moon Lake.

Meanwhile, Schrader and Commissioner Michael Cox are trying to protect a new $2-million incentive fund for the Economic Development Council to recruit high-tech industry.

And Cox attempted unsuccessfully to persuade the commission to restore part of a $100,000 increase to the EDC's proposed budget for the coming year.

"We all have our sacred cows," says Hildebrand.

The mooing over the sheriff's budget won't end Wednesday, no matter the outcome.

Included in the county's capital construction budget for the coming year is $20-million for a three-story addition to the jail in Land O'Lakes. Capacity now, including a minimum security temporary facility, is 1,418. The project is scheduled to add 768 permanent beds.

But with it will come future budget machinations. If all goes according to plan, sometime in the next two years the jail addition will open to be accompanied by higher costs to feed, clothe and provide medical care for additional inmates. That's not counting the estimated 60 new employees - corrections officers and support personnel - to supervise them.

It's a point Hildebrand keeps making in the budget deliberations. The decision to build the jail all at once, instead of in phases, means the county must account for future operating costs, at an accelerated level, in the not-so-distant future. Meanwhile, voters will consider amending the Florida Constitution in January to take additional residential property off the tax rolls, which will mean even more difficult budget negotiations next summer.

Hildebrand repeats another question voiced publicly by County Administrator John Gallagher: For what level of service is the public willing to pay?

"The public is accustomed to having services and needs met. They call up and want a pothole filled or a ditch cleaned and we do it," Hildebrand says. "Now those dollars are disappearing, and the competition for them is extremely keen.

"These are all worthwhile programs, but at the end of the day the cuts have to be made."

[Last modified September 1, 2007, 20:51:17]