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Cowlitz County reviews 2025–27 budgets, staff proposes one-time cuts and levy path to cover shortfall

Cowlitz County Commissioners · October 28, 2025
AI-Generated Content: All content on this page was generated by AI to highlight key points from the meeting. For complete details and context, we recommend watching the full video. so we can fix them.

Summary

Cowlitz County finance staff presented a revised general-fund budget and a menu of one-time and recurring options Tuesday as the county faces a projected 2026 shortfall and a larger gap in 2027.

Cowlitz County finance staff presented a revised general-fund budget and a menu of one-time and recurring options Tuesday as the county faces a projected 2026 shortfall and a larger gap in 2027.

Kathy, presenting Budget Boss figures, told commissioners the county’s largest revenue stream — taxes including property and sales taxes — produces about $63 million for 2025 and roughly $61.9 million for 2026 and 2027. She said personnel is the single largest expense, with salary and benefit budgets shown at about $46.9 million for 2025 and a projected $48.0 million in 2027.

The nut graf: staff projected that, under current assumptions, expenditures will exceed revenues and reduce the county’s reserved fund balance. Kathy said the budget as presented would produce about a $2.4 million negative difference in 2026 versus revenues and an $8.1 million gap between total expenses and revenues in 2027. The county’s designated budget-stabilization and related reserves were noted in discussion as roughly $5.4 million in restricted accounts.

To address 2026, staff proposed a combination of one-time and recurring moves. One-time measures included drawing on internal reserves (staff noted an IT reserve of more than $5 million and proposed a one-time use that could reduce general-fund impacts by about $1.0 million), reducing billings and…

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