As we noted here last week, Monday was D-Day for county manager Mike Ruffin, who was scheduled to present an update on the county's financial circumstances and its capital projects plan.
The upshot? The oddness that is today's world economy seems to have led to two very different directions for how the County should move forward on these items: proceed on a $250 million capital projects effort even while looking to trim $14.5 million from this year's operating budget.
The municipal bond market has been extraordinarily tight, with high interest rates even for those who are borrowing there -- a condition that led many to think earlier this fall that projects like the new county courthouse and human services center might be paused.
Yet short-term interest rates are extremely low -- as little as 1.25%, the county's financial advisor noted at Monday's meeting -- and Durham, with its rare and vaunted AAA credit rating, can access such funds.
Meanwhile, the worldwide recession has depressed the cost of building materials, meaning the county should be able to get a (relative) bargain when it comes to putting shovels in the ground and steel girders in the air.
The proposal, as noted by the scribes from the H-S and N&O, is to go ahead with the $100 million human services complex on E. Main St. and the now-$143.5 million courthouse complex; Ruffin noted that a delay to the latter project would impact a planned future expansion of the adjacent jail. (The courthouse complex will free up a parking and logistical space to the jail's eastern side that can then be used to expand the detention center.)
Even as the horizon looks good for major construction projects, however, Ruffin is projecting a $14.25 million deficit for this fiscal year; County departments have made up for $9 million of this through spending cutbacks, he noted at Monday's work session, but still needs to find $5+ million more to weather the storm.
Ruffin has proposed 3% in budget cuts to the county's $100 million contribution to Durham Public Schools, a move decried by school board chair Minnie Forte-Brown, though Ruffin noted drolly (and was quoted widely as saying) that DPS' Fuller St. administration building "has three floors of people who are not in the classrooms" -- a reference to possible administrative cuts being one way Ruffin could see DPS making it through. Durham Tech would also be impacted.
Non-profits and other organizations that rely on the county for funding -- including the Animal Protection Society, Downtown Durham Inc., the Chamber of Commerce, the Museum of Life and Science, and Urban Ministries among them -- are also up for 3% in cuts, a topic that will be discussed at the board's Jan. 12 meeting, per the H-S and N&O reports.
You missed something in the article that has me very, very upset:
"Counting unspent operating and capital purchase funds and unspent salaries from vacant positions, departmental cuts ranged as high as 27.6 and 28.2 percent respectively for courts and emergency management."
We know we have a problem with our criminal justice system. Part of this problem is judges, ADAs, and their staffs being unable to handle their current case load. They need time to prepare themselves, argue for justified sentencing, and to separate the minor offenders that can be easily rehabilitated from the repeat offenders that need some more time to 'wake up' before they'll be ready to become productive members of society. Another problem is the length of time it takes a violent offender out on bond to get to trial and be placed in the state prison system. I can't wait to see how much better the crime stats will be in 2009. There's going to be some armed robbers and domestic abusers out on bond all year waiting for their trials. I wonder what fun they'll have when they're out.
I'm actually pretty angry about this.
Posted by: Rob | January 06, 2009 at 08:08 AM