County Executive will introduce her FY 2021 spending plan.
Frederick, Md (KM) Budget time begins soon in Frederick County. County Executive Jan Gardner says next week she will introduce her proposed fiscal year 2021 budget. “I’m going to focus on making sure we can deliver essential services,”: she said.
In a recent appearance on WFMD’s “Morning News Express,” Gardner noted that the major sources of revenue for the county are property and income taxes. “And we know income tax revenue wil take a hit,” she says. “Fortunately, we are a very conservative county. We have done very conservative budgeting.”
With that, County Executive Gardner says she has built up the county’s reserve funds since she took office. “When I became the County Executive, our rainy day fund was at its minimum. I have increased that and put money into reserves every year,” she says. “So we are in much better shape to weather a storm than we would have been had this happened five years ago, and we haven’t recovered from the recession yet.”
After she introduces her budget, the County Council holds public hearings on the spending plan. It can subtract money from programs in the budget, but it cannot add money to a program by transferring funds from another program. The Council usually votes on the budget before the end of May.
“Financially, I lived through the downtown in 2009 and 2010 as a County Commissioner, when we had write down our budget, lay people off. Things are still very fresh in my mind,” Gardner recalled. “So we will move forward carefully and cautiously.”
The economy is expected to take a beating because of the coronavirus emergency as non-essential businesses and other organizations have closed down, and those that are still up and running are operating at reduced hours and seeing fewer customers.
By Kevin McManu