Faced with an approximately $5.5 million difference between expected revenues and expenses, the Board of Lewis County Commissioners mandated that department heads — elected and appointed — submit 2025 budget proposals that were 5% below 2023 actual expenditures.
Commissioner Scott Brummer said Thursday that the request was challenging, as the county essentially asked department heads to absorb the inflation that has increased expenditures over the past two years.
“I do think costs have gone up, just price points, inflation,” Commissioner Sean Swope said Thursday. “And it’s finally starting to catch up with us.”
By state law, the commissioners must adopt a balanced budget where expenditures cannot exceed the anticipated yearly revenue.
The deficit has been whittled to around $3 million, though, over the next six weeks, county officials will look to adopt a budget without dipping further into reserves. Seeking to avoid increased taxes in the face of flat revenue, the county commissioners said they will look to other avenues to bring in additional money while considering additional cuts.
“It won’t be an easy decision,” Brummer said. “There’s tough choices ahead.”
In September, the commissioners raised concerns over new caseload limits — or “standards” — adopted by the Washington State Bar Association (WSBA) that could reduce the maximum caseload for public defenders by two-thirds. According to data provided by the county, Lewis County spent between $1.3 million and $2 million on indigent defense each year between 2013 and 2022.
On Wednesday, the commissioners hosted their third and final all-day budget meeting, where Lewis County Prosecutor Jonathan Meyer said similar restrictions could be implemented for prosecutors, too.
“When we talk about caseload standards, everybody tends to look at it from the defense side,” Meyer said. “What most people fail to realize is that before a case ever gets filed, it’s been in our office.”
According to Becky Butler, county budget administrator, the county estimated that the new caseload standards could require 15 additional defense attorneys. Potential caseload standards for prosecutors could require a similar influx of manpower, Meyer said.
“The prosecutor study that’s coming up is going to be much more in-depth and much more involved. It’s going to be eye-opening and, quite frankly, I think it’s going to be scary,” Meyer said. “Because if we had the same standards applied to us that they’re talking about applying to the defense, our estimation is that we would need an additional 25 attorneys.”
If held to the suggested budget numbers, the Lewis County Sheriff’s Office faces about a $1 million shortfall for next year, which could result in cutting eight full-time equivalent (FTE) positions.
According to Lewis County Sheriff’s Office Special Services Chief Kevin Engelbertson, that could include two operations staff, a corrections lieutenant and five corrections deputies.
“That’s the only other thing that we feel we could cut and still maintain what we currently have right now,” Engelbertson said. “I don’t know how else to say that other than we’re cutting FTE positions if we’re truly a million dollars short. That’s our option.”
Cutting the positions, Engelbertson said, would mean “not responding to certain calls.”
“It’s going to mean less services to the public,” Engelbertson said.
According to Lewis County Sheriff Rob Snaza, the county has not promoted a lieutenant at the jail or hired a deputy in the sheriff’s office since he learned of the “budget issues” approximately eight months ago. According to Snaza, the department is currently down four deputy positions and is attempting to fill two.
“You’re talking about taking away employees, and that’s the only way we can handle the million-dollar cut,” Snaza said. “At the end of the day, law enforcement services are necessary to be provided in Lewis County. And I think that’s one thing that we cannot cut back on. Because once we start to go down that hill, I don’t know how we come back up.”
Snaza said currently the department’s budget is inflated through overtime necessary to maintain minimum staffing levels. In July, corrections deputies logged a total of 1,500 hours of overtime to maintain staffing at the Lewis County Jail.
The department has established a minimum staffing level of four deputies on the road, which Snaza said is a challenge to cover the county. With time-consuming calls creating constraints on deputy’s time, Snaza said ideally he would increase the minimum staffing level to five or six deputies.
“You get one lost hunter, one lost mushroom picker, and you’re taking that east end deputy to go there, that leaves the rest of the calls to the other staff to handle,” Snaza said. “It’s a challenge that we face daily.”
Shad Hail, Lewis County Juvenile Court administrator, said the Juvenile Justice Center faces similar constraints. If the proposed 2025 budget is adopted, Hail said the department would struggle to implement it.
“We’re not taking deputies off the road. That’s not happening. Our juvenile detention facility, we’re not putting them in a risky situation,” Swope said. “I think, in my opinion, I see where we can pull from. And then depending on how some of our projects go, that’s going to help.”
While Lewis County will formally adopt a budget in early December, there are some positive signs.
Commissioner Lindsey Pollock said Wednesday the county has contracts with the Department of Natural Resources that could bring in an additional $1 million or so in revenue, which could further reduce the deficit, while Swope said there’s been “encouraging growth” on sales tax revenue.
Swope also floated the possibility of a “public safety tax” that would help “offset and provide the funding.”
“I think things will pan out. We have a lot of open positions that we’ll get credit back from that,” Swope said. “By all means, it’s not good the direction where things are, but it’s not as bleak as what we thought and we’re making some serious course corrections right now.”
Last month, Lewis County Commissioner Lindsey Pollock said the county must look at “middle management” when adopting a budget.
“We’ve taken a big look at open positions and middle management positions, just where the fat is and leaning it down,” Swope said. “Most of our departments run very lean anyways.”
Last year, the county eliminated six positions, including the chief of internal services and the housing and infrastructure specialist, that “conservatively” saved $500,000.
