County budget transfer request rejected

LACONIA — Projected shortfalls in the administration budget for Belknap County will continue for the foreseeable future.

The county commissioners had sought to have nearly $16,000 transferred from a contingency fund to cover expenses which will exceed the amount of money budgeted in two areas of the county’s $30.2 million spending package. But the Executive Committee of the County Delegation declined to approve that request Monday, and instead tabled it.

The commissioners said $15,841 was needed to cover the full cost of auditing the county’s financial records as well as its handling of federal coronavirus relief funds, plus an additional $3,000 for health insurance costs for the administration's finance office.

The total administration budget is $388,977, and members of the Executive Committee were told that the actual cost of the audits would be $43,750, county administrator Debra Shackett said in an email on Tuesday. The Legislative Delegation – which controls the county budget – appropriated $27,909 for the audits.  

But the Executive Committee said money in the contingency fund is intended to be used in emergency situations, and that no emergency exists at this time because the county departments are only two months into the fiscal year.

“The contingency (fund) is meant to be a last resort,” said state Rep. Michael Sylvia, who chairs the County Delegation and serves as a member of the Executive Committee. “No emergency exists.”

County Commissioner Glen Waring told the committee that, based on current projections, the budget for county administration will have a deficit of $10,167 without an infusion of additional money.

Committee Chairman state Rep. Ray Howard said the matter might need to be re-examined later in the year as the money in the budget continues to be spent down. But at this time, he said, there was no immediate need to bolster the budget lines as requested by the commissioners.

The Executive Committee cut $1.7 million from the commissioners’ recommended budget of $31.9 million, including money from both line items that the commissioners are asking to be replenished with money from the contingency fund. The delegation subsequently approved the committee’s recommended $30.2 million budget last month on a 11-7 vote.

After the committee’s 4-1 vote tabling the transfer request, Waring told the panel that while the need for the additional funds “is not imminent,” he said county department heads need reassurance that funds will be reallocated as necessary to cover expenses as they continue to drive a department’s budget closer to deficit territory.

“I will give you my word that will happen,” Howard said, stressing that he was speaking only for himself and not for the committee.

“We are trying to give reassurance to the department heads,” County Commission Chairman Peter Spanos said.

County Nursing Home Administrator Shelley Richardson and Corrections Superintendent Adam Cunningham have previously told the commissioners that there is a strong possibility that there is not enough money in their department’s budgets to cover all expenses.