CHARLES TOWN, W.Va. — The Jefferson County Commission held a public meeting on Thursday night to go over revenues and expenditures for this fiscal year, as well as reviewing past years’ expenses.
The entire board was pleased to see the room at capacity, with many of the citizens stepping up to express their opinions on how the funding should be allocated.
Property taxes are still currently the largest source of income for the county, and they generated a little over $12,000 for the last fiscal year.
In contrast, the dwindling income from the coal severance tax and the casinos have led the county to look elsewhere for funding.
The largest expense for the county is for General Government at 53%, or $14.1 million – this includes personnel and operating expenses for departments like the county and circuit court clerks, assessor, tax office, planning, zoning engineering, and maintenance.
The biggest organizations requesting funds were the public libraries and Parks and Rec. services.
Kathleen Hintz showcased some impressive numbers for the public libraries, stating that attendance has been up by 8% this year for the Bolivar-Harpers Ferry Library, and program attendance has increased to 35%.
Ann Mountz, the Vice President and Chair of the Fundraising Committee for the Jefferson County Parks and Recreation, said the majority of their funding goes towards staff salaries, and with more funds they could hire someone to plan larger, special events.
“Then we could bring in additional people to the county to help us and our revenues, as well as to help the hotels and the restaurants and stores and get that snowball effect going.”
Mountz also said that Parks and Rec. facilities help children stay off of the streets and keeping them busy with dances and Nerf gun Wars.
Many concerned citizens also would like to see something done about the feral cat problem in the county through the implementation of an official Trap-Neuter-Return organization, as most citizens are simply doing it themselves.
Those who spoke in favor of this organization said that helping these cats can in turn help the public by removing a potential public health concern from the streets.
The commission emphasized that they will be providing full transparency of their budget projections and how they will be spent on their website at jeffersoncountywv.org.