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Bourbon County reviewers find flood-related infrastructure strains, set joint department-head budget presentations
Summary
A Bourbon County budget-review meeting highlighted depleted reserves after recent flooding, rising salary lines tied to rescinded federal guidance, EMS staffing pressures and a plan to hold joint department-head budget presentations with pre-submitted questions. The committee approved the presentation format by voice vote.
Bourbon County officials spent their meeting reviewing recent audit trends, discussing infrastructure and emergency-services costs, and approving a plan for joint department-head budget presentations.
County finance staff member Josh said recent flooding “has pretty much depleted reserves” used for culverts and related repairs, and that the county is now seeing a wave of infrastructure failures as it dries out. He told the committee that aging galvanized culverts and bridges are showing more wear and that asphalt and gravel roads are also deteriorating after the storms.
The audit and budget review showed year-to-year shifts officials said were caused by several non-operational items. A committee member summarized that the 2023 audit numbers were lower because some funds were pass-throughs and the commission elected not to transfer money into reserves that year; 2024 reflected restoration of those transfers. The review also noted a roughly $97,000 reallocation in 2025 that was moved from a central finance line into several department budgets, including the clerk and treasurer, which made those departmental budgets appear to spike.
Committee members flagged a separate staffing cost driver: a Department of Labor guidance that briefly raised minimum-salary calculations for some elected positions. The guidance was later rescinded, but committee members said budgets for 2025 already reflected the higher salaries.
Caroline, a committee member who reviewed public-safety accounts, said EMS schedules show large variations in hours worked and that many EMS employees can work “from 40 hours a week to 80 hours a week,” a pattern the committee noted as inflating apparent per-employee salary totals. Caroline also said the mill levy earmarked for public safety has been reduced by about three mills since roughly 2020–21; members discussed that some of that reduction was backfilled by revenues from local turbine projects in prior years.
Officials discussed options for vehicle fleet management and mentioned exploratory discussion with Enterprise (the fleet company) about fixed replacement schedules. Members also noted the county’s heavy reliance on sales tax revenue for hard-surface road funding, referencing a COVID-era sales-tax spike followed by declines in more recent reporting.
The group agreed to change how they gather detail from departments. By motion, the committee approved a plan to have each department head present their budget in a joint session before the commission rather than relying on decentralized, ad-hoc meetings. Committee members asked that questions be submitted in advance so department heads can prepare responses.
The motion, as moved and seconded on the record, was adopted by voice vote (“Aye”). Committee members said they will attempt to schedule the presentations beginning Tuesday, July 1, with questions due in advance to help streamline short, back-to-back sessions.
The meeting closed after a procedural motion to adjourn, which passed by voice vote.
