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100 Methodology The basic approach used in this research was quite simple . Working from the most recent available county financial data, revenues and expenditures were allocated among three specific idential ; ( b ) Commercial/Industrial ; and ( c ) Farm . This allocation land use categories : ( a ) Res process was- carried out in conjunction with a series of interviews conducted with a variety of. local officials knowledgeable about the workings of specific departments — e . g . , the county health director, the public works director, the sheriff, the superintendent of schools , etc . Once revenues and expenditures were allocated to specific land use sectors , the ratio of revenues to expenditures for each sector was computed. A revenue -expenditure ratio greater than one indicates that that sector ' s contribution to the public purse exceeds its demands for public funds . Conversely , a revenue -expenditure ratio less than one indicates that the sector ' s demand for publicly financed services exceeds its contribution to local public finance . The basis for the current analysis was Chatham County ' s Comprehensive Annual Financial Report for the 1997 - 98 fiscal year. As noted above , the allocation of these data to specific sectors was done in consultation with a variety of local officials (listed in the Acknowledgements ) . These individuals were best equipped to assess the extent to which the various land use sectors partake of the services provided by their departments . Where feasible , expenditures were allocated to the various land use categories using available data on staff salaries and/or activities records . For example , the County Building Inspections Department maintains monthly records on the number and type of inspections conducted, and so we were able to compute the share of residential and commercial inspections and allocate the Inspections Department ' s expenditures accordingly . Often , existing records were not amenable to being decomposed into various land use categories . In many of these cases , we relied on a local official ' s best guess of how their department ' s efforts were allocated. Where the relevant officials were unable ( or unwilling) to make such a guess , we used one of two default allocation schemes that seemed most sensible . For services that exclusively benefit households ( as opposed to commercial establishments ) — for example , library services and Board of Elections services — we allocated expenditures based on 3