Storey County approves tentative budgets, including $21M in transfers to water and sewer funds

Storey County commissioners on April 7 approved tentative budgets for the county, the fire district, and water and sewer enterprise funds for submission to the Nevada Department of Taxation.

Controller Jennifer McCain outlined the key adjustments: capital projects approved in prior meetings were incorporated; the water fund includes CIP items such as the Hillside Divide Line and a lead siphon project (FY27 total $1.5 million); the sewer fund includes the Gold Hill Collection project ($6.5 million anticipated in FY27). Most notably, the general fund includes proposed transfers of $15 million to the water fund and $6.5 million to the sewer fund to support these capital needs. The county also increased some departmental budgets (for example, Recorder and Parks) and added a $65,000 transfer to Piper’s Opera House operations.

The board approved tentative water and sewer budgets and gave unanimous approval to the county’s tentative budget package and the fire district tentative budget. Staff said the transfers will be formalized as either loans or transfers and will return to the board for final approval at a subsequent meeting; money will not move until an explicit approval to transfer or loan is taken.

Why it matters: the transfers provide significant funding to move multi‑year infrastructure projects forward (water distribution and sewer collection improvements) after the board adopted related capital project approvals earlier in the budget cycle. The board’s action is procedural (tentative budget submission) but establishes the financial plan that staff will implement or adjust prior to final adoption.