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Camden County adopts 2025 budget, funds new homelessness department and Lakeland shelter
Summary
The Camden County Board of Commissioners adopted the 2025 budget as amended, approved a cap-bank resolution and introduced a bond ordinance for county college improvements; the budget creates a new homelessness department and allocates COVID/American Rescue Plan funds to a 60-bed Lakeland residential facility.
The Camden County Board of Commissioners on Thursday adopted the county's 2025 budget as amended and approved a resolution to exceed the statutory appropriations limit and establish a cap bank for 2025. The board also introduced a bond ordinance to finance $3,336,653 in improvements at Camden County College and set a public hearing for May 2025.
Why it matters: The adopted budget creates a new county department to oversee homelessness services and funds construction and programming for a 60-bed residential facility at the county's Lakeland complex, using COVID-era federal funds the county refers to as American Rescue Plan funds.
The board first approved a resolution authorizing the 2025 Camden County budget to be read by title only and then held a public hearing on a separate resolution to exceed the county budget appropriations limit and to establish a cap bank under state law. Director Cappelli opened both hearings and solicited public comment; no members of the public who had registered to speak did so during the cap-bank hearing. After the public hearing closed, the board voted by roll call to adopt the cap-bank resolution and later to adopt the budget as amended.
Deputy director Ross McDonald told the board the budget includes a newly formed homelessness department that will operate a residential shelter at the Lakeland complex. “That was a new department that was developed, to address homelessness and to, run and and operate and oversee the homelessness shelter ... In the Lakeland area,” McDonald said. County staff confirmed the Lakeland facility is planned as a 60-bed residential program and that construction will start shortly; funds in the budget are intended to help program that facility.
County staff also described internal changes and spending oversight included in the budget. The county has an internal audit team that conducts proactive and requested audits, and staff said the department was expanded this year. On federal relief funds, county staff reported the county received $98,000,000 under the American Rescue Plan; those funds have been obligated to projects, with several reallocations as projects have closed. “We have projects. There have been several resolutions to, reallocate those funds between projects,” a county finance staff member said. The county stated those ARP funds are obligated and that spending is ongoing; staff estimated they are roughly “about the halfway mark,” noting some projects are large-scale and still in progress. Officials said the Lakeland homelessness project is being funded with those COVID/ARP dollars.
Members of the public asked how COVID funds were moved among projects and whether additional social workers would be hired for library-based outreach; a resident who identified herself as a library user was told the county had hired one social worker and that the 2025 budget does not include additional hires beyond that single position. The board heard questions about internal audit scope and got a briefing on the county's internal audit function.
The board also introduced a bond ordinance appropriating $3,336,653 for Camden County College improvements and announcing a public hearing on that ordinance in May 2025 at the Camden County Courthouse. The introduction was approved by voice vote and will be subject to the scheduled public hearing.
Actions taken included a roll-call vote adopting the budget as amended, approval of the cap-bank resolution, and introduction of the Camden County College bond ordinance. The board voted by unanimous consent to adopt blocks of routine resolutions numbered 1 through 77 with recorded abstentions on individual items; no motion was made on resolution 78 and it failed for lack of a motion.
Board members and staff emphasized that rising property values allowed for a tax-rate decrease: Deputy director McDonald reported the county's 2025 tax base rose by $7,000,000,000 over the prior year, a figure the county said, combined with last year's growth, enabled a net 5-cent reduction in the county tax rate for residents this year.
The board scheduled related public hearings and pledged follow-up briefings as departments move to implement the homelessness program and complete capital projects funded in the budget.
