Amherst County staff proposes nearly $73 million FY27 budget, warns of a roughly $15 million shortfall
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Summary
County staff presented a proposed full-expense FY27 budget near $73 million that includes 33 new position requests and a $4.1 million CIP; staff said projected revenues of about $58 million leave a gap that could require raising the tax rate to about 76.5¢ if the board sought to fund every request.
Amherst County staff presented a proposed full-expense Fiscal Year 2027 budget of roughly $73 million at a Feb. 17 Board of Supervisors workshop and urged supervisors to review a broad set of department requests before making decisions.
Tracy Morgan, who led the presentation, said the package includes the capital improvement program (CIP) requests, 33 new position requests and roughly $450,000 in equipment costs. Staff also included a $500,000 contingency and about $5.3 million in debt-service costs. "Weare throwing everything at you tonight," the presenter said, explaining staff would provide all raw requests for the board to review and pare back in subsequent meetings.
Staff said proposed revenue projections total about $58 million after equalization following reassessment. Based on those projections, Morgan said, fully funding the $73 million request would require a tax rate near 76.5 cents per $100 of assessed value, compared with the current 61 cents. As an example of homeowner impact, staff said reassessment raised a sample average home value from about $180,000 to $296,000 and that different rate choices could change the average annual real-estate bill by roughly $500.
Staff provided alternatives: a level-funding scenario that included only the health-insurance increase and a 3% across-the-board pay raise would reduce spending to about $62 million; conversely, adopting all CIP and position requests would leave a gap of roughly $15 million between proposed spending and projected revenues.
Morgan outlined next steps and statutory deadlines: staff will ask the board for a tax rate to advertise at the March 3 meeting, meet with nonprofits and schools on March 17, hold a called meeting March 25 to finalize advertising numbers, hold a public hearing April 21 to adopt the budget and then adopt the budget and tax rate at the May 5 meeting after the mandatory seven-day waiting period.
No formal votes on budget items were taken at the workshop; the board approved the meeting agenda at the start and adjourned at the end.
