Last week, Lane County administrator Steve Mokrohisky outlined a “surgical approach” to address the County’s budget, which he says has seen a persistent strain on public safety funding and a growing need for behavioral health and housing.
“We have a lot of uncertainty and chaos out there right now, there’s uncertainty from the federal government… uncertainty at the state level… and then, of course, we have local pressures here in Lane County,” he said at the May 6 meeting. “We’re not going to meet chaos with chaos.”
Every year, expenses exceed revenues, resulting in an estimated $6.3 million structural deficit in the General Fund for the next fiscal year, and “precise tools, not blunt instruments, are necessary to solve budget challenges and ensure delivery of valued public services,” he said.
The budget includes 34 distinct funds, with the General Fund as the primary source. It utilizes $53 million in property tax revenue to support public safety, health, elections, and other government operations.
He said it is common for local governments to see this deficit annually because the cost of providing services grows faster than the revenue from local property taxes collected to provide those services.
However, what is unique to Lane County is that the public safety system is “chronically underfunded” because it is one of the lowest property tax rates in the state, $1.28 per $1,000 of assessed value, Mokrohisky said.
Despite having a General Fund with nearly $100 million in property tax revenue – almost double that of Lane County — Marion County serves 40,000 fewer residents and has only a quarter of the geographic area to deliver these services, Mokrohisky said, adding that the county also relied too heavily on timber funding to support public safety services for decades.
“When timber funding went away and local property taxes were capped in the mid-1990s, it was a perfect storm that left Lane County frozen with an artificially low property tax rate to fund core public safety services,” he said. Public safety services receive about 75% of discretionary General Fund revenue.
He said that to fund public safety fully, all other General Fund services would need to be eliminated, impacting essential functions like elections and health services. He pointed out that public safety will continue (to be)underfunded without new and stable revenue. While these cuts address stabilizing current services, “solving this decades-old problem requires an infusion of new, stable resources.”
He said Lane County also faces challenges due to its heavy reliance on federal and state funding, which accounts for 60% of its revenue, compared to only 40% from local taxes and fees. Federal and state funding come with strings, leaving the county hamstrung with limited discretionary funds for services.
“It is a simple math problem, but requires complex, thoughtful, values-based solutions to minimize community impacts,” he said.
Cuts and increases
Over the past six months, County department leaders have identified expense reductions, including $3 million in permanent expense cuts in the General Fund to reduce positions, consulting services, vehicles, training, travel, and other operational costs, resulting in about 80 terminated positions – the most significant reduction since 2012. Those cuts include temporary employees who work up to 520 hours a year are decreasing in the General Fund by 37% and countywide by 18%, and all central services in Lane County, including technology, human resources, and facilities, identified permanent cost reductions averaging 6%.
He noted that “only 18 of the positions proposed for reduction are filled, and most of the people in those positions will be able to move into similar vacant positions in other areas of the County.”
A proposed land banking program, with an initial $2 million funding from the Video Lottery Fund initiative, aims to acquire parcels within Lane County’s urban growth boundaries to prepare them for affordable housing development. The program targets households earning at or below the projected area median income of $91,700 for 2025.
The proposal also allocates $5 million from opioid settlement reserves as matching funds for a $14 million request in state funds to support the Lane Stabilization Center, and $1 million annually from opioid settlement revenue for the center’s operations, dedicated to residents needing behavioral health services. Other additions include:
• The Lane County Office of Emergency Management is initiating an emergency training program for County staff, cooperating agencies, and communities to enhance disaster preparedness.
• The Youth Services Division has contracted with Wellpath to provide improved medical services and mental health treatment for youth in detention.
• A new deflection division was created to provide additional support and resources to clients with low-level offenses related to substance use.
“A chronically underfunded county public safety system and growing behavioral health and supportive housing needs remain the greatest challenges ahead,” Mokrohisky said.
The proposed budget for fiscal year 2025–2026 totals $1,219,976,394. This represents a decrease of $9,62,008, or 0.08%, compared to the previous year. The General Fund budget is set at $178,781,923, an 8.9% decrease from the current year.
Nine other funds remain structurally unbalanced and require reserves to balance, including the Land Management Fund, Public Safety Levy Fund, Community Health Center Subfund, Human Services Fund, LaneCare Subfund, Community Justice Subfund, Clerk’s Fund, Corners Fund, and Law Library Fund.
The Budget Committee started reviewing the proposed budget with a meeting and public hearing on May 6 and will vote on the budget on May 20. Once approved, the budget will be presented to the Board of County Commissioners for potential adoption in June.
