published: Wednesday, July 01, 2009

County budget still not ready for release

By ED BALDRIDGE

ed.baldridge@newssun.com

SEBRING -- Time is running short for the release of the first draft of the budget for Highlands County, but officials hope to get it out this week.

According to Highlands County Budget Manager Tim Mechling, the budget is coming, but is running a bit late.

"We are still waiting on some of the departments to finish up," Mechling said.

"The actual recommended budget is always done in July. We are a little late this year, but Florida statute says we have to have a balanced budget by July 15. We are going to make that easy," Mechling said.

Reportedly, County Administrator Michael Wright has said that he was holding the budget from the public view until it was complete in order to stop any "rumors" before the budget was final.

Earlier this year, Wright told commissioners during a meeting that county staff would have to take a "close look at what are core services."

Which could translate into job cuts at the county level.

Tax Collector Charles L. Bryan informed the county during the same meeting that he expected more than $9.1 million in unpaid property taxes in Highlands County in 2009, which is close to double the taxes not paid in 2007 and over 1,899 fewer paid in this year over the previous year.

The number of properties in the county for which taxes were not paid for 2009 was 15,554, a deep cut into the county's budget.

Bryan later updated the community that close to 98 percent of the unpaid tax certificates were sold to investors, but drops in state revenue sharing, local option sales taxes and fuel tax collections are still leaving the county considerably short.

To compound the issues, County Tax Appraiser Raymond McIntyre informed the county that property values could drop as much as 19 percent this upcoming year.

Even with the proposed cuts, county staff is still optimistic that the public will get to see something soon.

"We should have it in anytime within the next couple of days," Public Information Coordinator Gloria Rybiniski said.

"This thing is going to be huge. There are a lot of little budgets that go into this, and there are hundreds of documents. We should have it all together and get it printed in the next few days. Maybe today, maybe Thursday," Rybinski said.

The budget was still not available at press time.