County adopts $36.7 million budget

by Cat Urbigkit

At Tuesday's Sublette County Commission meeting, the commission voted unanimously to adopt a budget totaling $36,765,383 for the next fiscal year.

About half of the budget, $17,863,208, is allocated to reserve accounts, not spending accounts. The county will invest the reserves, earning the county interest revenue. Broken down, the reserves are allocated as follows: $1.2 million to equipment; $3.8 million to cash; and a total of $12.6 million in depreciation reserves. These depreciation reserves include $441,672 to landfill; $840,620 to the state-county road fund; $3 million to the county building project; $2 million to the senior center facilities; $1.5 million to county road projects; $829,560 to recreation; $500,000 to ag and fair; $500,000 to human services; $1 million to the courthouse and jail; $500,000 to airports; $1 million in museums; and $500,000 to library.

The commission held a budget hearing Monday evening in the courthouse, which about a dozen people attended. The commissioners explained that while the county is benefiting from mineral extraction efforts, it would like to capture that revenue.

Commission Chairman Bill Cramer said the county's valuation is as high as it has ever been and said the county should capture that revenue while it is being generated. Commissioners Betty Fear and Gordon Johnston agreed.

Special boards will receive the following amounts for expenditures in the coming year: $1.6 million for fire; $718,000 for recreation; $668,000 for library; $407,000 for fair; $323,000 for airport; $207,700 for museums.

General fund expenditures include the higher ticket items of $3.8 million for the courthouse complex construction project; $3.2 million for the county road department; $1.6 million for law enforcement (not including $398,000 for detention and $245,000 for communications); and a combined total of $1 million for the transfer station and sanitary landfill budget.

Other county departmental budgets are each generally less than about $200,000, with the exception of the assessor's office, which has a budget total of $212,096. See next week's legal notices in the Examiner for the final budget figures adopted by the commission.