Outside of cuts to education and a reduction in the property tax rate, Anne Arundel County?s budget office called next year?s spending plan “status quo.”
“We?re seeing a 4.9 percent increase in the budget, which is fairly typical,” budget officer John Hammond said. “We?re looking to maintain the level of service people have seen in the past.”
The County Council will vote on the proposed $1.2 billion spending plan for fiscal 2008 Thursday morning at the Arundel Center on Calvert Street.
The average taxpayer will see a slight drop in his tax bill despite a 2 percent rise in assessments, as the county will lower its property tax rate by 2.9 percent to meet the required cap on tax revenues.
The budget also includes an 8 percent increase in education, which is only half of what the county school system had requested.
The proposed budget includes:
» The purchasing of a plot of land in Wayson?s Corner to save it from development;
» $108 million to provide mass transit near Fort Meade;
» $200,000 for colonoscopies for the under-privileged (County Executive John Leopold is a cancer survivor);
» $300,000 for street lights in high crime areas;
» Assistance for owners of private wells that have high levels of radium.
“We have a lot of exciting things going on in the budget this year,” Leopold said.
But the county school board doesn?t share that enthusiasm, as many programs will be underfunded or not funded at all, school spokesman Bob Mosier said.
While the $541 million schools budget includes money to open two new schools ? Seven Oaks Elementary in Odenton and the Ferndale Early Education Center ? there is not enough funding to fully staff those schools, Mosier said.
He also said there is not enough money to pay for all-day kindergarten at 17 schools, registrars for college-bound high school students and to make IT improvements. The school system also got $1 million less than requested for security, he said.
“We?ve got a lot of cutting to do,” Mosier said. The school board will adjust its budget at the June 20 meeting.
The school budget does include adding 12 workers who help provide home schooling for at-risk students and expanding the international baccalaureate program into three middle schools.
“I respect the school board?s needs,” Leopold said. “But I?m working within the framework of fiscal and political reality.”
The entire budget document can be viewed online at www.aacounty.org.
