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Commissioners approve FY2026 recommended budget for public hearing after staff adjustments to step/LOSAP items
Summary
Finance staff presented a balanced FY2026 recommended budget with technical modifications; the board approved sending the budget, fee and tax-rate items to public hearing April 22 and accepted a health‑insurance rebate for LOSAP trust.
St. Mary’s County finance staff on Tuesday presented a balanced FY2026 recommended budget to the commissioners with several technical modifications; the board approved the package to proceed to public hearing and approved several related motions.
Finance Director Vanetta VanCleave and Deputy Joyce Atat said staff re-examined the budget during final review and found an accounting detail: funds previously assumed from LOSAP were budgeted in an enterprise fund, not the general fund, so they could not be used as a general-fund source. Staff also re-ran the step/merit increase run rate and identified savings of $1,215,866 by applying the run rate to the budget rather than front-loading all step increases into July.
Those changes improved the county’s emergency reserve by about $215,861 above earlier projections. VanCleave presented a recommended FY2026 budget that includes an emergency reserve target, a general fund balance estimate and a capital improvement plan totaling $75,402,517 for FY26 (with multi-year CIP items for 2027–2031 listed in the packet).
After discussion, the board approved the following actions: - Approve the FY2026 recommended budget as modified and execute related documents (motion passed; recorded vote 3–2). Commissioner statements indicated concerns about fairness and the need to revisit allocations after the state budget is finalized. - Authorize the finance department to schedule a public hearing on the FY2026 recommended budget on April 22, 2025. - Authorize a public hearing April 22 on proposed increases to certain county fees and charges. - Authorize a public hearing April 22 on raising volunteer rescue squad tax rates for Hollywood and Leonardtown volunteer rescue squads to 0.03 (a separate motion formalizing prior direction).
Commissioners debated delaying a market-adjustment portion of employee compensation until Jan. 1 (six months) to free up additional recurring funds for partner agencies; some commissioners preferred waiting until the state budget is final and addressing partner funding at budget work sessions in May. The board voted 3–2 to move the recommended budget to public hearing.
The commissioners also approved a staff motion to allocate a recently announced health‑insurance rebate of $986,043 to the LOSAP trust to help strengthen the county’s LOSAP funding position.
