Cascade County releases proposed 2022 budget, open for public comment until Sept. 7

Cascade County released its proposed Fiscal Year 2022 budget Tuesday morning that will be open for public comment until next week. 

The county opened a public hearing on the budget Tuesday, and it will remain open until Tuesday, Sept. 7 when the county commission is scheduled to take action on the budget. The budget is available to review online, and County Commissioner Joe Briggs said a printed copy will be available for review at the county commissioners chambers. 

County Budget Officer Mary Embleton said that the $74 million proposed budget represented a 1% increase from the 2021 Fiscal Year amended budget.

Briggs told the Tribune this 1% increase is the biggest takeaway for local taxpayers and that “a chunk” of the 1% is coming from newly taxable property. 

“We're trying to minimize the impact on our normal property taxpayers,” Briggs said. 

Briggs said that last year's budget got modified a lot due to COVID and that there’s a lot of federal funds coming to the county. 

“There's a lot more grant funding and a lot more COVID funding in this year's budget than what we've seen before,” Briggs said. 

He explained that the federal dollars designated in the budget for things like the Health Department and Aging Services reflect “pass through” dollars. The county’s ARPA funds have yet to be designated so the budget does not yet reflect that potential spending. 

“When we start allocating those, the budget expenditures and revenues will both go up,” Briggs said. “There’s so much money flowing from Washington right now through the system; everybody's budget is going to look like it's huge from a couple of years ago, which is why I say I think the most important thing the local taxpayers need to look at is the rise in property taxes.”

Briggs said there is more spending on capital expenditures in this budget, and pointed to examples like the new roof on the Adult Detention Center, the $1.5 million buyout of the state at the jail and fairgrounds improvements. 

Embleton said during the meeting there was a 2% increase for “elected and non-union folks.”

Embleton explained the budget consists mainly of the County-wide Mill Levy funds, county rural Mill Levy funds, the county road and reserves Mill Levy funds, the permissive medical Mill Levy funds Sheriff Retirement Mill Levy funds, and the Light and Maintenance Districts, “along with all other funds for operations in the county’s departments.”

No public comment was offered during the special meeting. 

Nicole Girten is a Government Watchdog Reporter at the Great Falls Tribune. You can email her at ngirten@greatfallstribune.com. To support coverage of Great Falls and Cascade County, subscribe to the Tribune by finding the "Subscribe" link at the top of the page.