Minutes 06-09-2011 - Laserfiche WebLink

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time serving the priority childcare cases and has a waiting list of over 550 families. For this reason, the budget includes $50,000 to be spent on childcare instead of emergency assistance. The department will implement an employment and training program for food and nutrition service recipients beginning October 1St. Existing staff will be used for this. Also, in capital outlay, there is $20,000 to replace outdated laptops and desktops. Nancy Coston said that the childcare crisis continues and Smart Start is being seriously affected. The crisis in the childcare subsidy program is affecting all of the other programs. Commissioner Jacobs said that he hoped the County could find the $50,000 to address the emergency funding and childcare. Chair Pelissier agreed with Commissioner Jacobs. • Board of County Commissioners Paul Laughton said that this budget went up very little from an operational point of view. There is $6,000 in benefits related to health, retirement, and 401(k). This is on page 6- 1. There is $1,700 in operational expense, for a total increase of $7,700. There is a significant increase of over$80,000 for removing items that were in non-departmental back into the County Commissioners' budget. This is the contingency fund of $37,000; meeting support for supplies of $4,100; and cable-casting of $40,000. Clerk to the Board Donna Baker said that cable-casting was brought up during her evaluation and the Board asked her to bring this back during the budget process. She had asked if the Board wanted to do any additional meetings and she has some preliminary figures on this. These additional meetings would include four quarterly public hearings and two budget public hearings. The four quarterly public hearings would be $1,550 each, which would total $6,220. The two budget public hearings would be $2,055 each. This would be a total of $8,300. Commissioner Yuhasz said that it is a disservice to the public if public hearings are not cable-cast. Frank Clifton said that another element of cable-casting those meetings is that there would be an eternal record on Granicus. Commissioner McKee said that the $8,000 would be better spent in Social Services. Commissioner Jacobs said that they also talked in the Clerk's evaluation about strategic communications. He would like to raise the issue because communication sometimes overlaps in the Manager's Office and the Clerk's Office. He suggested having a Public Information Officer starting in January. He said that the County Commissioners constantly note that communication to the public is inadequate. He wants to write up a job description and advertise. Commissioner Foushee cautioned the Board against going against the recurring expense until it is known whether the County can continue to fund the position. She suggested putting in a placeholder and saving the money until the position can be sustained. She agrees with the Public Information Officer, but she wants to be able to cover the recurring expense. Frank Clifton said that he agreed with a PIO, but money has always been the issue. He gave David Hunt credit because he fills that role to an extent. • County Manager's Office Michael Talbert said that there is the '/4-cent sales tax on the referendum in November. In the non-departmental budget, there is $50,000 set aside for that educational process. The County Manager's budget this year is $712,316, which is a 1.8% increase over last year. Most