Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, April 26, 1995 TAG: 9504260078
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-9 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: PAUL DELLINGER STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: PULASKI LENGTH: Medium
Funding requests from some agencies or organizations are taking bigger hits than others to achieve the balance.
The biggest expense is the school system. The School Board had asked for $8,375,250 from the county, a 6 percent increase over the current figure. The revised budget reduces that by 5.4 percent to $8,300,857.
The Board of Supervisors received the revised budget Monday night.
The offices of county administrator, registrar, commonwealth's attorney and sheriff will all see a 5 percent drop from what was proposed to the Board of Supervisors at the April 3 budget session. At that meeting, the board directed County Administrator Joe Morgan to revise the budget to avoid cutting into reserves to balance it.
Fire and rescue funding will see only a 1 percent drop from its proposal. Public works categories, including post-closure work at the Cloyds Mountain landfill, is down 11 percent. Health and human services has an overall 3 percent drop. Parks, recreation and cultural funding is down by 12 percent.
Morgan had already cut the amounts requested by many county agencies for the April 3 presentation.
Under the revised budget, new funding requests from the Free Clinic of the New River Valley, Appalachian Railroad Heritage and Friends of the Pulaski Theatre will not be funded at all.
Also eliminated is the $100,000 the county was going to put into the Dublin Town Center, to share space in a new Dublin Town Hall at the town's industrial park. County offices were to be included in that facility to serve people in the eastern end.
Capital improvements still maintain funding for the Claytor Lake water system ($800,000), data processing equipment ($58,000), firearms for the Sheriff's Office ($75,000) and ambulance replacement ($55,000).
The $80,000 proposed for sheriff's vehicles is reduced to $60,000. A number of items have been eliminated, including $16,000 for county vehicle replacement, $20,000 for the central gymnasium roof, $100,000 to complete the third floor in the restored Old Courthouse, $4,000 to complete a geological exhibit there, and $25,000 for automated circulation in county libraries.
Overall, almost $1.4 million in proposed capital expenditures, which would have required $544,000 from reserves, has been reduced to $995,121.
Offices or agencies wanting to argue for more funding than is now proposed will get their chance at a board meeting at 7 p.m. Monday. Presentations will be limited to five minutes.
by CNB