Fayette commissioners adopt $28.9 million budget
By a 2-1 vote, the Fayette County commissioners on Monday approved a $28.9 million general fund budget for 2014.
The budget, which was approved during a special meeting, does not include a tax increase, meaning the property tax millage rate will remain at 4.51448.
With revenues projected to be $28.9 million and expenditures to be $28.7 million, the spending plan shows a surplus of $238,883.
Commission Chairman Al Ambrosini and Commissioner Vincent Zapotosky supported adoption of the budget, with Commissioner Angela Zimmerlink casting the lone no vote.
“Commissioners don’t always agree on every budgetary line item, and that’s not just for Fayette County but other counties as well,” she said. “In the past seven out of the last 10 budgets, I approved seven of them stating that although you fund the budget, that does not mean that all the commissioners would agree to fund it throughout the year. And for those budgets that I passed, for those specific line items that I was not agreeable to … I vote against those expenditures as they come up during the year.”
However, concerning the last three budgets, as well as the 2014 spending plan, she said she believes the county is on the road to having a “huge deficit.”
“Although the commissioners passed this budget this year without a millage increase, they’re going to have to have a millage increase this year or the next,” she said.
She said she disagreed with Act 13 and gaming money being used to balance the budget. She also noted that figures for the proposed budget were very different from the figures in the adopted budget, and that this will be the second year in a row that the county will not set money aside for the Annual Required Contribution (ARC) to the pension fund.
“The budget that you propose and the adopted budget should be very close — as close as you possibly can get it,” she said.
During public comment, Clerk of Courts Janice Snyder said the budget “stinks.”
“I have asked more than once, more than twice to hire additional staff for my office,” she said.
In response to Snyder’s remarks Ambrosini said, “There’s a lot of people who didn’t get what they wanted.”
He said the county is going to launch efficiency and effectiveness efforts, procedures and processes in the coming year.
“Until we improve some efficiencies we’re going to ask everybody to tighten their belts, support our efforts and be part of the team,” Ambrosini said.
In an unrelated matter, Zimmerlink requested to schedule an executive session by Tuesday afternoon with the Prison Board, the sheriff and the warden concerning the investigation into an inmate’s suicide at the Fayette County Prison last week.
According to the Allegheny County Medical Examiner’s Office, Derek Andrew Thomas, 25, of Oliver died at UPMC-Presbyterian hospital in Pittsburgh last week.
Warden Brian Miller said a corrections officer discovered Thomas hanging in his cell around 6 p.m. Dec. 22. He was incarcerated on burglary charges, according to court documents. Thomas was initially taken to Uniontown Hospital and later transferred to UPMC-Presbyterian.
Zimmerlink said she and the prison board members were informed about the incident via email on Dec. 23 but have not received information about the investigation since.
Zapotosky said that he “supports review of this matter in-depth.”
“It’s a tragedy. Regardless of how you feel, a life has been taken,” he said.