Thurston County commissioners direct staff to model chair’s budget plan, restore animal-services funding target removed

Chair Ty Menzure opened the Sept. 26 Thurston County Board of County Commissioners work session by reminding attendees that the meeting was a continuation of budget deliberations and not a public-comment hearing: “This is not a meeting where we take live public comments.”

The board spent the session reviewing remaining revenue and reduction options to close a roughly $36 million structural shortfall for the 2026–27 biennium and debated how to handle a list of targeted reductions and unlocked revenue sources. County Manager Leonard Hernandez and Budget and Fiscal Manager Summer Miller presented follow-up research the board had requested on a group of potential revenues and policy fixes, including the cultural access program tax, changes to real-estate excise tax rules, two pending state bills that may affect local receipts, and internal options such as furlough days, COLA adjustments and licensing/recording fee changes.

Why it matters: commissioners must adopt a preliminary biennial budget and meet statutory posting and hearing deadlines in December. The board said it wants a plan that balances across offices while protecting high-priority services; it also emphasized that final decisions will occur when the adopted budget is approved, not at the work session.

Miller told the board she had reviewed “under every rock” as requested and reported a legal/administrative limitation on the county’s ability to impose a cultural access program tax (CAP tax) without legislative change. “After review of the interpretive documents, Thurston County may not…