The Hamilton County 911 board has received what they call a “windfall” from the state level, the board announced during their board of director’s meeting.
“When the state board set the new surcharge rate at a $1.50, it was approved under the legislative session, but the new rate doesn’t go into effect until 2021,” one board member said. “The state board knew there were many districts needed that increased revenue immediately to maintain fiscal operations.”
“The state board elected to subsidize districts for the first six months from their reserves for the estimated amount of the surcharge.
That was about $15 million pushed out. For the first six months, the estimated income from the new surcharge for Hamilton County would be $958,984.”
The board members said many of these districts were in “dire financial condition,” and so they would be in a “dire” situation if they did not have this sudden influx of cash. And so the state board decided to take money from their reserves in order to help out districts who need money.
As Daisy Madison pointed out during the meeting, the money shows up as unexpected revenue without any sort of obligation to spend it on a particular project or section.
“It’s unbudgeted because the state board had not approved it when we went through the budgeting process,” one of the board members said. “There was some issues they had to work through to approve it. It was expected, but because it was no approved at the time, we did not put it in the budget as expected revenue.”
“It’s my understanding that the 911 board gave all of the districts money to shore it up, so their budget would be the same throughout the year,” continued the board member. “So the budget is the budget, it’s just that the unexpectedness of that one-month “gift” is to make our budget whole. Because for the next year, the $1.50 increase will be for the entire 12 months.”