Meigs County finance committee approves multiple budget amendments, forwards them to full commission

The Meigs County Finance Committee voted to approve a slate of budget amendments and administrative corrections and forward them to the full county commission for final action. Committee members approved amendments to retirement and payroll lines, grant-related budget changes, an invoice for volunteer insurance, and updates tied to unexpectedly higher TVA impact receipts.

The committee approved an amendment to the retirement payroll line after the general sessions judge hired a new probation officer; Leslie, a county staffer, said new employees are automatically enrolled and a budget line must be created. The committee also approved an increase to the ambulance budget’s unemployment compensation line to reflect payroll growth that occurred after the fiscal-year budget was adopted.

A motion to add $3,324 to the county’s “other charges” line was approved to cover an invoice for volunteer accidental/insurance protections for volunteer firefighters; staff said a copy of the invoice is available on request. The committee approved a water-and-sewer line increase in the sanitation budget to cover expected costs through the remainder of the fiscal year.

The committee moved and approved a $50,000 reimbursement grant for the senior center, which staff said the pool commission has already accepted and for which bidding began in March. Committee members also approved a pair of related amendments after staff reported TVA-impact receipts were higher than estimated: staff had budgeted roughly $300,000 in impact funds but said the county actually received about $511,000; the committee approved updating the budget so the county can transfer the full 25% share to the jail reserve fund and reflect the additional revenue on the general-fund side.

The ambulance department reported receiving a reimbursement grant (stated in the packet as $39,000 and shown as $30,303 to be billed as a reimbursement) and plans to use department reserves for cardiac-monitor purchases; the committee approved the amendment to apply the grant and reserves. (The transcript lists the equipment total as “4969267”; the formatting of that figure in the record was ambiguous and is not reported here as a finalized dollar amount.)

Committee members also approved a corrective resolution to fix a typographical error in a 2020 reserve resolution involving ambulance equipment and rescue-vehicle reserve amounts. Several motions were made, seconded and passed by voice vote; the committee used unanimous voice approvals for the items it forwarded to the full commission.

The committee did not take final commission action on these items; each approved amendment will be considered by the full county commission in a future meeting. The meeting proceeded to additional administrative items after the votes.