Auditor reports 2011 deficit

 

November 18, 2010



First glance at Whitman County’s 2011 budget shows a deficit of less than $100,000, Auditor Eunice Coker said Monday.

As the 2011 spending plan begins to take shape, initial figures look better than anticipated. Coker cautiously told a room full of county officials at a lunch time meeting.

“The budget looks, tentatively right now, like current expense is not too far out of balance,” she said.

After four amendments to the 2010 budget, the county is currently projected to spend $827,866 more than it takes in by the end of the year.

But Coker said 2011 expenses submitted to her from various department heads have better matched revenue projections for next year.

Coker has the responsibility of compiling the first budget submittals from departments this year after taking control of the county’s finances in July. Budget preparation had been done by employees working under the commissioners for the previous two decades.

After the county’s finance department was sacked in June, though, Coker presented commissioners with a set of state laws that state the auditor has the responsibility of preparing annual budgets and year-end financial statements.

The 2011 budget process started roughly.

With the finance department gone, county officials had to scrape together forms to put forth their expected spending numbers.

That led to a series of miscommunications.

As data was entered from those sheets onto standardized forms, some columns were missing and some expenses were left off the ledger.

After a month of double-checking the figures, Coker said she just last week had verifiable information from every department.

She tallied all that up to come up with the five-figure deficit projection.

“We had some rough spots in the beginning of our preliminary budget preparation,” said County Commissioner Greg Partch. “Our main goal with the 2011 budget is to keep services and keep people employed.”

Commissioners will now negotiate with those department heads to try to close the gap and make sure all the numbers are properly in place.

They have scheduled a public hearing on the budget for Dec. 6.

 

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