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 impose a cap tax via councilmanic action or voter approval,” she said, and staff have asked legal to confirm the Department of Revenue interpretation and to coordinate with outside counsel if warranted.

On other state-level measures, staff reported that House Bill 1791 (described to the board as increasing flexibility in uses of real estate excise tax funds) would not create new revenue for the county but could broaden allowable uses for existing REET receipts. Staff said the county would research whether that flexibility applies to both REET 1 and REET 2 and would report back.

Staff also summarized anticipated local impacts from two transportation and tax proposals: the effects of Senate Bill 5801 would not flow to the general fund but are estimated to add about $170,000 to the county road fund through County Road Administration Board distributions; and the fiscal effects of Senate Bill 5814 (a proposed new state sales tax on some services) are uncertain and — per the county auditor and Department of Revenue communications cited by staff — should not be relied on in the 2026 budget until at least a year of actual collections is available.

The board discussed other internal options staff quantified: a six-month observation window for projected increases to licensing and recording revenues; estimated costs for nonrepresented employee cost-of-living adjustments (COLAs) of roughly $703,722 to the general fund across the biennium (with countywide COLAs estimated at about $1.16 million); and an estimated daily general-fund savings from unpaid furlough days of about $287,400 (the board observed that the total savings would scale with the number of furlough days adopted).

Animal-services funding and JASCOM: the session included extended debate over a previously proposed targeted reduction of $500,000 to Thurston County’s contract with the Joint Animal Services Commission (JASCOM). Commissioner Patricia Mejia moved to approve the chair’s preliminary budget proposal but remove the $500,000 target for JASCOM; after discussion and separate motions, the board voted to remove the previously set $500,000 target and to leave the county contract at full-service funding for the biennium while pursuing state-level, longer-term funding options. Commissioner Mejia noted ongoing work with state representatives, and said a bill being developed by a state lawmaker could create a dedicated animal-services funding mechanism.

Formal board direction: commissioners approved three discrete items during the session. First, they directed the chair and county manager to meet with Prosecuting Attorney John Tunheim and draft proposed legislative changes to the CAP tax language for submission to the county’s legislative delegation. Second, after extended debate on funding priorities and process, the board directed the county manager to incorporate the chair’s budget proposal — with the exception of JASCOM funding — into the county’s budget model and return with updated targets next week. Third, the board removed the explicit $500,000 reduction target for JASCOM and left the contract at full-service funding for the biennium while pursuing legislative options described by commissioners and staff. All three directions were approved orally by voice vote (ayes from the full board were recorded).

What happens next: staff said they will load the chair’s proposal into the model, check calculations and return to the board at the Oct. 1 work session and the following week. The board asked to receive the updated model at least 24 hours before the meeting to allow commissioners and the public time for review. Budget staff committed to providing the updated model to commissioners by the end of business on Tuesday, ahead of next week’s public meeting.

A note on process and timing: commissioners and staff repeatedly flagged statutory deadlines for budget adoption and levy certification in December and said the board must produce a set of preliminary targets in October to meet public-notice and hearing timelines. Commissioners who objected to approving targets at this meeting said they needed additional time or a differently formatted spreadsheet to finalize their review, but the majority voted to proceed with staff direction to model the chair’s proposal and to restore the JASCOM funding target.

No final appropriations were adopted at the Sept. 26 work session; staff will return with an updated budget model and recommended targets for additional board action prior to the November/December public hearing and adoption milestones.

Ending: Commissioners praised budget staff for rapid analysis and modeling work and scheduled follow-up sessions to finalize targets and public hearing materials.