FARMINGTON – The Franklin County budget committee, meeting in the District Court building Monday evening, approved a $4.9 million budget for the 2009-2010 fiscal year.
The single major decision made by the committee at the public meeting was to increase the funding of Western Maine Community Action, an organization which offers various kinds of social service assistance to lower-middle income families. The committee unanimously approved a $16,500 increase in the agency’s funding line, a departure from the strict “flat-funding” policy for program grant funding that’s been in place for years.
All in all, the budget represents a 1.1 percent increase of $54,000 from the 2007-2008 budget, the last full-year budget. The county will shortly be completing a six-month fiscal cycle designed to bring the budget in line with the state.
The commissioners had also recommended that WMCA’s annual county funding be increased from the usual $33,000 to $49,500, a $16,500 jump. Previously, commissioners had voted to flat-fund program grants, concerned that one increase would result in every agency requesting similar treatment.
However, the committee this evening voted to increase the line after hearing several members of local community groups speak to the necessity of the funding. WMCA’s Rosemary Poulson reported that her agency had received a $32,000 energy conservation grant through the JTG Foundation that would require a local match.
“We view this project as an economic project,” she told the committee, “as well as an energy conservation project. We have to have these matching funds.”
Others, such as Rev. Susan Crane who helps oversee the Franklin County Ecumenical Heating Fund. Noting that her group provides money for fuel, not weatherization, Crane said that this project would help assist her efforts by reducing the load.
WMCA Executive Director Fenwick Fowler said that the funding from the county would pay for the weatherization of 65 homes in Franklin County.
The committee also had to add back in another $10,000 to cover county personnel’s FICA payments, which had been slightly low for some time. In an effort to close with the LD1 limit, the committee approved recommendations to increase the amount of Undesignated funding used to reduce the budget from $300,000 to $350,000. Committee members also joined with commissioners to ask the Franklin County Sheriff’s Department to cut $25,000 from their overtime line.
“Thank you very much,” Committee Member Steve Barker, who serves on the Jay board of selectmen, told Sheriff Dennis Pike. “I know it’s not going to be easy, but thank you.”
The final budget of $4,901,339, despite nearly $700,000 in cuts from the original budget requests, was still above the LD1 limit by slightly less than $40,000.
Committee members decided to “exceed” the limit, rather than increase the cap. This means that the county will need to “pay back” the extra $40,000 in the budget after 2009-2010, as well as make the current cap.
The local assessment for the budget will be $4,150,839. Commissioners must still technically approve the process at their meeting Tuesday morning, but any significant further changes are unlikely.
