Geauga County’s 2023 budget has increased by $3.1 million — due, in part, to the passage of a county road levy in 2021.
Geauga County’s 2023 budget has increased by $3.1 million — due, in part, to the passage of a county road levy in 2021.
“The Geauga County 2023 tax budget is $128 million, which is about $2.2 or $1.7 more than the 2022 adopted budget,” said Adrian Gorton, Geauga County budget and finance manager during a Geauga County Commissioners meeting June 28.
Gorton said the increase is due, in large part, to the county engineer’s office passing a road levy in the fall of 2021 and not being able to budget those funds until the beginning of this year.
“This resulted in a $3.1 million increase in the overall budget,” said Gorton.
Other notable changes to the proposed 2023 tax budget include a $3 million increase in the Chardon Township sewer project as it is near completion and a $1 million decrease in project funding being requested by water resources in their county sewer improvements fund.
Gorton said there was a $400,000 increase in the 2019 commissioners’ capital reserve fund due to the new county office building reaching completion this year.
“A $460,000 decrease in airport construction with the newly-completed T-hangars, and concealed handgun licenses were reduced to $180,000 due to some changes in the license requirements this year,” Gorton said.
The general fund portion of the 2023 tax budget is $39.1 million, which is an increase of about $1.2 million in the 2023 tax budget versus what was adopted as the permanent appropriations for 2022 back in December, he said.
“Some of the reasons for this are an increase in the funding needed by 911 operations, court technology and the (Geauga County Sheriff’s Office’s) 800-megahertz communications, an increase in staff and contract service requests for the auditor and ADP, and payroll account increases requests from the prosecutor’s office and the sheriff,” said Gorton.
He said revenue continues to trend up so far this year.
However, mortgage rates are increasing, as are new construction costs, and there is a persistent tight supply of existing homes on the market, as well as an expected collection rate from the budget commission of 98% for 2023, which “is reflected in a flat property tax collection next year,” Gorton said.
Geauga County Senior Fiscal Specialist Deborah Ashburn said sales tax continues to be the county’s largest source of revenue.
“Almost half of the general fund revenues comes from sales tax,” said Ashburn. “Property tax comes in as second and is the second largest source at about 24%, so together, they make up about 71% of all the revenue that we receive in the general fund and in numbers, we’re talking like $25.8 million of the $36.3 million that we received.”
Gorton presented a graphic look of the general fund over the last several years.
“At one time, we shifted about a half a mill towards debt retirement,” said Gorton. “We do budget relatively conservative on the revenue. We are trying to get to be more closely related to the actual without overextending ourselves and being surprised, particularly in the event of a recession and how that could potentially affect some of our revenue sources.”
The budget also describes the property tax overview for residents in the county. For every $1 of property tax paid, 17.5 cents goes to funding county programs, with the other 82.5 cents going to local schools, townships, municipalities, public libraries and the parks.
Gorton addressed some of the fund balances, including the department on aging.
“Their current unappropriated balance in their fund is about $2.2 million,” said Gorton. “The department on aging is a levy-funded department that has to be used for senior services and they will be transferring funds to help build a new Chardon Senior Center.”
Gorton said the cost and timing has yet to be determined, but they have deposited $1 million in the senior center construction fund at the end of last year from the funds received for the sale of the senior center to Ravenwood.
“That money will be used to help build the new senior center,” said Gorton. “Currently, we are in the architectural phase of planning out that new building.”
Gorton said there is currently $9.1 million in the American Rescue Plan Act fund, which was taken as a standard allowance for lost revenue to be used for a variety of projects.
“Not the least of which is the enhancements up on the square from the recently-approved settlement agreement with the City of Chardon, and that will also be in conjunction with this $4.5 million that we have in the building improvements fund, which we have been building up over the last couple of years,” said Gorton. “That will be used, as well, for buildings on the Chardon Square.”
Gorton said future planning for the county includes maintaining efficient services for county residents while modernizing and securing existing facilities.
“We want to remain, as always, watchful over the resources that are provided to us by the residents of this county, and we are looking to maximize every opportunity granted to us at the state, local and federal levels in order to realize our long-range plans and convert them into short-term goals,” he said.
