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County administrator presents conservative FY 2025–26 recommended budget; tax rate held flat
Summary
County Administrator Ian McGahee presented Yuma County’s recommended FY 2025–26 budget, which holds the combined property tax rate steady, includes a 3% performance-based compensation increase, reduces overall appropriations by about 4%, and sets recession contingencies for major funds.
Ian McGahee, Yuma County administrator, presented the recommended fiscal year 2025–26 budget to the Board of Supervisors on May 5. The recommended budget reflects a multi-month review and is intended to be fiscally conservative and sustainable, McGahee said.
McGahee said the county’s recommended total appropriations decrease by about 4% compared with the current year, driven in part by reductions in one-time expenditures. The General Fund showed a roughly 1.4% decrease in appropriations. The recommended budget includes a 3% performance-based compensation increase for employees and proposes no net new full-time equivalent positions; the package results in a net reduction of about 16.125 FTEs across all funds, with a small increase (0.14 FTE) in the General Fund.
Revenue assumptions cited in the presentation include a county-assessor projection of overall net assessed value growth of about 5.47% (with new construction at more than 7% and an assessed-value increase for existing properties of approximately 2.34%). The budget keeps the county’s combined property tax rate the same as the current year; for the typical sample home used in the presentation (market value shown as $281,191), county staff estimated a $15.93 annual increase to the general-fund portion of the bill from assessor growth, and a combined increase of about $23.37 when flood control and library amounts are included. McGahee emphasized conservative revenue forecasting and recommended maintaining strong fund balances, including recession contingencies for several funds.
Board members discussed longer-term fiscal planning. Several supervisors urged the board to examine 10-year projections and not rely solely on current growth, and suggested that modest future rate adjustments (for example, small incremental increases over several years) may be worth considering as a preventive step to preserve fund balances for roads, public safety and other county services. Supervisors also raised requests to prioritize funding for road maintenance, animal-control capacity and other direct public services as the board refines the tentative budget in June.
McGahee said the board would receive department-level presentations the following day and that a tentative budget would be adopted June 2, with final adoption at a combined budget and Truth-in-Taxation hearing on June 23. No action was required at the May 5 presentation.
