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Lincoln County auditor presents provisional FY2027 budget, flags $8 million shortfall
Summary
Lincoln County Auditor Sherry Lund presented a provisional FY2027 budget showing expenditures growing faster than revenues, a projected general fund gap of roughly $8 million (about half tied to roads and bridges), and recommended commission decisions on courthouse capital needs, a salary study, and longer-term strategic planning.
Sherry Lund, Lincoln County auditor, told the commission on June 9 that a corrected provisional FY2027 budget had been posted after software import errors and asked the board to treat the document as a working draft for review. "The budget is not a staff budget or an auditor's budget. It is the county's commission budget," Lund said, urging commissioners to offer solutions rather than simply voting no on the draft.
Lund said the county continues to fund core services — public safety, roads, emergency communications, rural services, airport needs and debt obligations — but identified two pressure points: the General Fund, where expenditures are growing faster than revenues, and the Road and Bridge Fund, where revenues are declining while expenditures rise. She cited provisional figures showing General Fund revenue projected at approximately $25,600,000 and General Fund expenditures budgeted at about $33,600,000, noting the gap will require commission direction on reserves, project phasing and transfers.
The auditor's package includes a proposed 3% cost-of-living adjustment for personnel and flags $2,000,000 in courthouse capital outlay for critical maintenance as a priority for commission consideration. She also recommended waiting to finalize personnel adjustments until after the upcoming salary study. Lund cautioned that the provisional document still contains formatting and footnote issues from the software transition and said she would publish line-by-line department spreadsheets and verify several apparent mismatches between narrative percentages and table values.
Commissioners asked for additional detail on fund-balance drawdowns, whether road-and-bridge projects should be phased, and the timeline for the salary study; Lund said the salary study will be shared with department heads in two weeks and she would supply requested spreadsheets. Members of the public urged cooperation and compromise during a challenging budget cycle; one commenter pressed concern about the county budgeting roughly $8 million more in expenditures than revenues and asked how that will affect property-tax payers.
Next steps: the auditor said the commission will hold a budget work session (rescheduled from June 23 to June 30) and that a first public hearing on the provisional budget is scheduled for Sept. 1, with final adoption possible by Sept. 22. The numbers in the provisional packet will be verified and corrected as needed before formal hearing documents are released.
