Douglas County staff present 2027 budget changes; commissioners set maximum levy at 40.286 mills

Brooke, a county staff member, told the Douglas County Commission on the final day of 2027 budget hearings that the commission’s changes reduced the delinquency rate from 2% to 1.5% and trimmed “nearly 453,000” from the 2027 budget. She said commissioners also reduced the county general fund by nearly $420,000 by moving some permanent supportive housing partners into the behavioral health sales tax fund to maximize capacity in that dedicated fund.

Brooke said the budget restores funding for the KU Innovation Park and expands capacity for the KU Small Business Development Center, and adds operational support for the mobile integrated health program (including a team lead) and compensation support for the senior resource center. She said a set of one-time projects will be paid from fund balance and that spending those allocations will lower the fund-balance target presented to the commission from 22% to about 21%.

Staff will ask commissioners at their evening business meeting to establish a maximum levy rate of 40.286 mills, a change Brooke described as a spreadsheet rounding difference from the prior 40.285 figure. She explained the mill calculation used a larger base value and the 0.001 difference came from that calculation method.

Commissioners traded views on whether to reduce the reserve to 20% now to lower the levy. Commissioner Dorsey asked whether moving the reserve to 20% would lower the levy immediately; several commissioners cautioned using one-time fund balance to lower an ongoing mill levy would “put us in a hole next year” by removing the capacity to fund ongoing services and would be a departure from past practice. The chair said they had discussed the trade-offs previously and did not have “an appetite to reduce it any further.”

Brooke provided a staff calculation of the dollar amount required to move the fund-balance target to 20%, saying the adjustment including one-time expenditures would be about $1,000,002.75 as presented. She also gave the estimated value of one mill under the 1.5% delinquency assumption as $2,000,002.82 to illustrate the tax-dollar impact of rate changes.

Brooke told commissioners the spreadsheet attached to the agenda details the commission’s budget and that the version they review tonight will be the one taken to the formal adoption hearing on Aug. 26, when the certified budget will be submitted to the state budget office. She said staff will prepare and publish the required state budget forms and notices if the commission authorizes submission of the R&R rates to the clerk.

The commission concluded the budget hearings and planned to reconvene for their evening business meeting where staff will repeat these proposals and formally request the maximum levy be set.