County budget of $30.3m okayed; delegation, commissioners dispute impact

LACONIA — The Belknap County Delegation approved a $30.3 million budget Tuesday, an amount $1.7 million below what the county administrative authority had requested and nearly $445,000 less than what it considers vital to the proper operation of county departments.

The budget passed on a 11-7 vote after 2½ hours of discussion and debate, which included comments from the county commissioners and the general public. Members of the delegation were limited to one hour for questions and comments, while the commissioners were given only 15 minutes to speak.

The chairman of the County Commission said the budget process was rushed.

The majority of the 18-member delegation attended the meeting in person at the county complex, with a handful of representatives, one commissioner, plus the public attending virtually by live teleconference.

State Rep. Michael Sylvia, the delegation chairman, said there is enough money in the budget for county departments to operate. Prior to the vote, he noted the package contained a 5.6 percent increase in spending over last year.

But County Commission Chairman Peter Spanos told the delegation the cuts that the delegation's Executive Committee was recommending to numerous expense lines would mean some departments would use up the money allocated for those expenses before the end of the year.

He said requests for supplemental appropriations are inevitable.

“This budget is not sustainable going forward,” Spanos told the meeting. “It will be clear that we have a significant shortfall,” Spanos said Wednesday.

The delegation's Executive Committee cut $1.7 million from the commissioners’ recommended budget of $31.9 million. Of that total, $16.6 million would have come from property taxes, resulting in a 12 percent increase in the county’s tax levy.

County Administrator Debra Shacket said that increase would have resulted in an additional $36 in property taxes for a home assessed at $250,000.

The five-member Executive Committee voted on Jan. 18 to recommend the $30.3 million figure, which would cut the county tax levy 11 percent compared to last year. County commissioners sent a letter asking asking the delegation to restore about a quarter of the proposed cuts, more than half of which were earmarked for the operation of the County Nursing Home.

Several times during Tuesday’s meeting Sylvia said that if funds a department has for a particular expense run short, it is free to reallocate funds designated for another expense in that department. However, any request to transfer more than $1,000 out of one department’s budget to another would need to be approved by the Executive Committee. He also said the budget contains $200,000 in contingency funds, but that money cannot be touched without the committee’s approval.

Sylvia rejected the argument that the delegation was micromanaging county spending.

“We don’t manage the budget,” Sylvia insisted. “We go out to the public and say, 'This is what we want from you in taxes.'”

Spanos said the $444,824 the commissioners were asking to be put back into the budget were “essential, critical, and urgent” to the ability of departments — notably the Nursing Home, the Sheriff’s Department, and Corrections Department — to operate effectively. Returning those funds back to the budget – together with reducing the fund balance from $3 million to $2 million – would produce a 1 percent reduction in the county tax.

State Rep. Norm Silber, a member of the Executive Committee, suggested the commissioners’ original recommended budget contained more money than was necessary.

“Why didn’t the commissioners at first request a budget with a 1 percent decrease in taxes?” he asked.

Spanso attributed “a large chunk” of the difference between $1.7 million cut by the committee and the $444,824 in critical expenses the commissioners wanted returned to maintenance projects which will now be deferred to another year.

Sylvia said he did not take the request for the $444,824 to be added back into the budget all that seriously, arguing that although the commissioners signed the letter, the request did not really come from them, but rather “the administration.”

A motion by state Rep. Jonathan Mackie to add $444,824 to the Executive Committee’s budget recommendation was defeated, with only four of the delegation’s 18 members voting in favor.

Sylvia said the Executive Committee’s budget recommendation was based on an assumption that the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic would continue for some time. COVID restrictions have resulted in far fewer residents in the nursing home, and fewer inmates in the county jail.

But Nursing Home Administrator Shelley Richardson told the meeting that she hoped to begin admitting more patients to the nursing home in March, once all residents and staff have had their necessary COVID vaccinations.

She said as it stands there will not be enough money in the budget to cover all of the expenses for health insurance, computer software, and professional certification expenses, as well as the tax which the nursing home is required to pay to the state. In addition, the money for food service has been cut by $150,000, and Richardson said there will not be enough money to pay for oxygen used in breathing treatments. Those treatments have been administered by different means because of COVID restrictions.

Sheriff Bill Wright said the cuts to his budget will mean he will be unable to fill a part-time position in his department. In addition, he said, there will not be enough money to purchase covert listening devices used by officers or informants in drug investigations.

“The drug team may not be functional,” he said.

Spanos said the full delegation spent too little time working on the budget.

“Not enough time was given to go through the budget line by line,” said Spanos who was a state representative and served on the delegation for six years.

He said that in past years the delegation would not approve the budget until sometime in March.

“They appeared to be in a great hurry to get this approved,” he said.

Sylvia said the county has not always been straightforward in the past in its dealings with the delegation related to the budget.

“I’ve been around long enough. I’m familiar with the tricks that have been pulled. I’m not going to stand for it,” he said. “If funds are needed they will be paid. But games will not be played.”