County cuts budget

Mineral County Commissioners signed into effect a new budget Wednesday that cut hundreds of thousands of dollars from the county’s budget.

“They’re going to have to watch every little piece of money they spend and every little piece of money they bring in,” Mineral County Commissioner Judy Stang said about county departments.

Stang said that the county had already laid out its budget for the coming year when they found out that their tax revenue would not be nearly what they had expected.

She said that the Mineral County Sheriff’s office, which was already in financial trouble, had to cut around $300,000 from its budget and the county had to cut nearly $200,000 from its general fund.

So far, the Mineral County Sheriff’s Office has cut one officer from full time to half time and let go one dispatcher and one jailer to meet their yearly budget.

Stang said that if the sheriff’s office does not bring in the money that they have projected they will bring in they may have to lay off more employees.

In a June meeting to discuss budget problems with the sheriff’s department, Mineral County Sheriff Hugh Hopwood suggested allowing his officers to write more speeding tickets as a way to bring in more money.

He said that currently the officers only write speeding tickets when they see someone going at an astoundingly dangerous speed and they usually call in the Montana Highway Patrol on other speeders.

Hopwood said that while he would not be authorizing his officers to set up speed traps he would allow them to pull over speeders that they see while out on patrol more often rather than calling them in to the MHP.

The county has had to cut funding for the county’s museum and the county fair, among other projects.

Stang said that the senior citizens’ groups in Superior and St. Regis will be hard hit this year as the county’s contribution to those programs has dropped from $4,158 down to $2,855.

She said that Mineral County’s growth in population and decrease in tax revenue is responsible for most of the cuts.

“The revenue just isn’t there to provide the services that we need,” Stang said.

Stang said that actually the county will have about the same general fund budget this year as last year but the commissioners anticipated more money coming in and, with rising gas prices and annual raises for employees, the county is coming up short.

Stang said that the county’s biggest problem is that the county is not getting the revenue from property taxes that they expected they would.

She added that power lines running through the county used to provide a good source of tax revenue but in order to reduce the amount of protested taxes the state decided to reduce the taxes on power lines.