The Anne Arundel County Council eliminated budget errors and trimmed excess funds in payrolls and pensions to find more money for schools and nonprofits.
“It?s fairly common to go through the budget and an auditor finds someone getting more funding than they have in the past,” said Council Chairman Ronald Dillon Jr., R-District 3. “Any budget compiled by humans has errors and judgment calls.”
The council made $3.5 million in cuts to County Executive John Leopold?s proposed operating budget and that money increased funding for public schools and grants to nonprofits, two groups that saw heavy slashes in their budgets. Leopold did not return calls Thursday for comment.
Of the council?s cuts, $900,000 were from mistakes, including $440,000 in salaries for four fire department positions that were removed from the budget.
More than $2 million were made in over-statements, such as nearly $950,000 in the pension plans for the police, fire and detention/sheriff?s departments, Assistant County Auditor Charles Mannion said.
“There are ?X? dollars per person and that was the plan [the county auditors] followed,” Mannion said. “That makes sense in the county world.”
But Assistant Budget Officer Kurt Svendsen said most of the extra money compensated for an anticipated 1 percent drop in the police officers? contribution to their pensions.
While no adverse effect will come to the pensions, the county will have to pick up the tab next year, he said.
Mannion and Svendsen said mistakes occur because of the massive amount of data processed in a short time. They also noted the figures are small compared to the overall $1.2 billion proposed budget.
The school board had requested a 17 percent increase in its budget, but got only 8 percent from Leopold. The budget shortfall could lead to larger class sizes and mandatory fees for clubs and sports.
“It doesn?t get us to the level that we feel we need to be at to make some of the improvements,” school system spokesman Bob Mosier said.
BUDGET CUTS
» Over-statements in utilities: $365,000
» Pensions: 935,000
» Fire department uniforms: $390,000
» Detention Center and sheriff department staffing: $450,000
» Errors in fire department payroll: $440,000
» Library system health insurance: $350,000
» Workers? compensation self-insurance: $187,000
» Miscellaneous canceled program, errors over-statements: $419,100
Source: Anne Arundel County Assistant Auditor Charles Mannion
