Jared Blanton, the Levy County Commission’s budget officer, explains a taxation issue to the board Tuesday.
By Terry Witt – Spotlight Senior Reporter
Security for the Courthouse Annex disappeared like a puff of smoke in a strong wind at Tuesday’s Levy County Commission meeting.
When commissioners learned they would be receiving $54,000 less in property tax revenues next year, they reversed their two-week old decision to fund two sheriff’s deputy positions for the annex.
The board voted 5-0 to remove $106,000 from the Levy County Sheriff’s Office budget for two deputies to patrol the hallways and offices of the former school. The money had been approved at the June 18 meeting.
The Courthouse Annex is the name most often assigned to the former Bronson High School and Bronson Elementary School building directly behind the Levy County Courthouse.
As it stands now, with the security money removed from next year’s budget, the building will remain unprotected unless the two elected officials who are moving from the courthouse to the annex, Tax Collector Linda Fugate and Property Appraiser Osborne Barker hire private security to protect their offices or they pay for the deputies. Or their employees can carry concealed weapons in the building to protect themselves.
Barker raised the question of whether his employees could carry a concealed weapon after the vote to revoke the security money. County Coordinator Wilbur Dean said the board would follow state law. Employees licensed to carry concealed weapons can possess them in the annex. The guns must remain concealed.
“I’m going to encourage more of my people to carry concealed weapons. We’ll take care of it ourselves,” Barker said.
Barker expressed concern, however, about what could happen at the Fugate’s tax collection office. All of her employees are women and Barker said Fugate’s female employees frequently leave with members of the public to oversee driver’s road tests. Sometimes the people they leave with are convicted felons trying to get their licenses back.
Barker said the mere presence of law enforcement can be a deterrent to problems.
But Commission Chairman John Meeks said the Levy County Sheriff’s Office is two miles away and the officers at the sheriff’s office could respond if there was an issue. He felt the board needed to move forward with Commissioner Matt Brooks’ motion to remove the security money from the sheriff’s budget.
“As you pointed out, it is not the courthouse,” Meeks said.
The former school is being converted to office space for the tax collector, property appraiser, building and zoning, veterans’ affairs, the county attorney and the county commission offices.
Jared Blanton, the commission’s budget officer, said the county commission wasn’t obligated to provide security for the building. He said he checked with 13 surrounding counties and 12 of the 13 weren’t paying for additional security in buildings housing the offices of elected officials.
Fugate was on vacation and didn’t attend Tuesday’s meeting. She was called for comment but didn’t respond.
Blanton said removing the $106,000 in annex security money shifted the proposed budget for next year from having a $50,000 deficit to having a $50,000 surplus.
Property tax revenues are projected to increase by 4.2 percent in next year’s budget, but expenses are also rising. Blanton said union negotiations are about to begin and he doesn’t know how much tax revenue will be needed to fund increases in pay.
His concern is taking all the additional tax revenue generated by the healthier tax roll and allocating it to recurring expenses. It could lead to problems down the road if an emergency occurred such as a hurricane. He said the county’s reserve cash could be stretched thin.
Blanton said he has also been made aware that the sheriff could be asking for hundreds of thousands of additional tax dollars in mid-year when he anticipates the state and federal governments will require changes to his communications system.
Blanton said the budget is in much better shape than a few years ago.
“It’s not as bad as it has been when I was looking up from the bottom of the pool,” he said. “Now we pop our head in and out of the surface.”
He said the county budget isn’t overflowing with cash.
“It’s tight. It’s not desperate, but it is tight,” he said.
Blanton said most of the revenue loss that was originally projected to be in the county commission budget resulted from a miscalculation of tangible property values, and most of it in natural gas lines.
Blanton said the original estimate was for a $227,000 loss in tangible tax revenue. He received a lower estimate of $54,000 from Barker’s office Tuesday morning. Barker said his consultant was involved in revising the numbers
By removing the $106,000 security money from the budget, Blanton said the county turned a potential deficit into a $50,000 surplus.
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Levy Board of County Commission Regular Meeting July 2, 2019: Posted July 2, 2019
