County Considers Millions In Funding Cuts, Lake Stone Funding Gone

March 21, 2008

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Escambia Commissioners have identified about $10.5 million of a needed $12 million in budget cuts, including funding for Lake Stone near Century.

The county had funded Lake Stone (pictured above) to the tune of $23,472 last year, and they had ranked it at number 34 on a list of 78 county departments. But during a budget workshop Wednesday, the commission decided to cut the funding and allow it to become self-supporting.

Other items considered by the commission to cut costs:

  • continue a hiring freeze on roughly 100 vacant positions
  • pay for some capital outlay projects on credit to make more funds available in the current budget
  • form a committee to decide if about a half million a year that goes to the Pensacola Area Chamber of Commerce and the Pensacola Escambia Development Commission for job development could actually be done cheaper by the county
  • eliminate three positions from the county’s human resources department, outsourcing the work
  • county parks and recreation events must make enough from their fees or they would be cut
  • inmate labor will be used for park maintenance such as mowing
  • suspend county employee tuition reimbursement
  • cut an assistant county administrator position and its office aide, saving $210,823
  • consider early retirement buyouts
  • cut the $115,000 for the Human Relations Commission that hears fair housing complaints
  • cut the county’s Merit System Protection Board from $126,225 to $35,000 per year. The board exists to provide civil service employees a way to air work grievances, but the board has never heard a case.

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Written by William Reynolds · Filed Under News