Typically, the few people who speak out at the county government’s annual budget hearings are department heads or their supporters putting in a funding plug for their favored program.

But this year, the Porter County Council kicked off its budget work by hearing a different message: A call for fiscal austerity.

As Clarence Rivers reminded the council Monday, what constitutes as good news these days is for people to know they still have their jobs.

“Personal family budgets are strained almost beyond what they can bear,” said Rivers, the county’s former chief juvenile probation officer who spoke of how the current economic downturn has trimmed his own family’s spending habits.

He urged the council to remember history: During the early 1980s, unemployment was higher than it is now, and county departments routinely were held to tight budgets, earning Porter County a reputation for sound fiscal management.

Similarly, Midge Rivers reminded the council of deep cuts that the county had to make in previous years. Given the poor economy, now is not the time to increase county spending, she said, as she urged the council to focus on the essentials.

“Please, please, please really take a look at everything” in the budgets, she said.

Also speaking at the annual budget hearing was Ruth Ann McWhorter, a former county council member who addressed two separate but related matters involving the county parks department.

McWhorter urged funding for the parks’ naturalist program, saying that she was dismayed to learn that a south Porter County third grade class ended up taking a field trip to Lake County when there was no naturalist in place at Sunset Hill Farm County Park.

She urged a close look at the budgets to free up spending so that Porter County kids don’t have to go out of county for nature field trips.

“I think this is unacceptable when we have a nice facility at Sunset Hill,” she said.

She also noted the plan in the Porter County Convention, Recreation and Visitor Commission’s budget to eliminate the $89,100 venue funding for the county parks, Expo Center, Memorial Opera House, and Old Jail Museum.

With a total PCCRVC budget in excess of $1 million, McWhorter said she thinks the agency can afford to keep the “miniscule portion” of its budget set aside to help promote the other county venues, which she said in turn will benefit children, seniors and families of this county.

Also addressing the council at the budget hearing was County Parks Superintendent Ed Melendez, who presented a set of photos showing maintenance needs at the parks.

Porter County Auditor Jim Kopp said that tentatively, the county government expects to have an additional $1.24 million in property tax funds for its main general fund in 2010. The council-approved general fund for this year was $32.9 million.

But as Council President Robert Poparad, D-1st, noted, the budgets submitted by departments are already $2.85 million more than this year’s.

“So obviously, that’s not going to work,” he said.

Council member Dan Whitten, D-at large, said he wholeheartedly supports the audience members’ concerns about clamping down.

He said that he will look at each department’s budget individually and will consider raises and other funding requests based on each one’s performance.

“It’s going to be a long, arduous process,” he said of the upcoming hearings. If the public thinks the council has already been fiscally conservative, “you ain’t seen nothing yet.”

“Let’s see it,” responded another man in the audience who raised concerns about increased taxes.

The council approved first reading of all budgets and funds as advertised in the required legal notice. As is the norm in the budget process, the advertised amounts are much higher than what they will end up at.

Poparad urged the public to attend the budget hearings, which will continue today at 5 p.m. with a review of the budgets for the courts, probation departments, and social service agencies.

Prior to Monday’s budget hearing, the council held a regular meeting to approve budget transfers to cover the following shortfalls: Hourly expenses totaling $17,000 in the clerk’s office, bedding and supplies totaling $700 at the animal shelter, and supplies and hourly expenses totaling $15,225 in the commissioners’ budget.

Another request was from Kopp for a $2,946 transfer from an unused portion of a deputy salary to overtime. The council approved the request 4-2, with Whitten and Rita Stevenson, D-2nd, voting no.

Posted 8/11/2009