Montco bracing for more belt-tightening
After enduring layoffs, consolidations, and a debt-rating downgrade in recent years, Montgomery County officials are again bracing for more belt-tightening.
After enduring layoffs, consolidations, and a debt-rating downgrade in recent years, Montgomery County officials are again bracing for more belt-tightening.
As they prepare to draft their 2014 budget, county officials last week said they had identified at least $3.2 million in new expenses related to health care, the federal sequester, and redevelopment deals gone bad.
The number seems small compared with the $59 million in budget cuts during the last two years.
But with an eye toward those extra costs, the county has implemented a "strict scrutiny" hiring system, requiring the approval of the chief finance officer and chief operating officer to fill any vacant positions.
In a report to the commissioners last week, CFO Uri Monson said county positions "may be eliminated" under next year's budget but made no mention of layoffs.
Among the new 2014 costs Monson outlined:
A $2.6 million increase in employee health insurance cost.
A $528,000 interest payment on a redevelopment project that foreclosed in May. The county-guaranteed loan for Logan Square - better known as the former Sears shopping complex at Markley Street and Johnson Highway in Norristown - will cost the county $9.4 million through 2030.
Another failed investment in Norristown, this one in a sewer project, will cost the county $110,000 in 2014, according to Monson.
Those two projects, approved under the previous administration, have also cut into the 2013 budget. The county recently made an $8,883 payment for the sewer project, and the county Redevelopment Authority made a $363,362 payment for Logan Square.
In 2013, the county also lost $24,785 in tax rebates from Build America Bonds. The federal government has been withholding the funds due to its own budget woes and may withhold another $31,000 before the end of the year.
The federal sequester also reduced drug and alcohol treatment funding by $64,301, children and youth funding by $14,613, and workforce investment funding by $103,000. All of those losses resulted in program reductions.