SALISBURY – Officials in Wicomico County agreed this week to extend the date for adopting the Capital Improvement Program for fiscal years 2020-2024 to next month.
On Tuesday, the Wicomico County Council voted unanimously to extend the adoption date for the fiscal years 2020-2024 Capital Improvement Program (CIP) from the third Tuesday in February to March 19.
The extension is expected to give the county council more time to review and discuss the county executive’s proposed CIP.
At a work session later in the meeting, Councilman Marc Kilmer questioned how capital improvements at the proposed Poplar Hill drug treatment facility would be funded. He noted the county executive did not include the project in the CIP.
“It would seem like it would be a capital expense,” he said. “I was just curious how that would be handled.”
Director of Administration Wayne Strausburg said the county would work with state partners to secure capital funding for the proposed treatment center.
“We are going to try and leverage the state for more money, to be honest with you,” he said. “We want to keep any investment by the county to a minimum.”
Councilman Larry Dodd told county staff he was led to believe county funds would not be used to finance the project. Strausburg, however, noted the time and effort spent to launch the facility.
“I’ve spent a lot of time on this, Weston [Young, assistant director of administration] has spent a lot of time on this,” he said. “We get paid by the county, so it’s a minimal investment.”
While he applauded the administration for proposing pay-go, or pay-as-you-go, funding to address deferred maintenance and airport projects, Council President John Cannon said he was concerned that the county’s proposed financial commitment for capital projects nearly doubles from fiscal year 2020 to fiscal year 2021.
“In the plan, if I read it correctly, we go from about $22 million in county responsibilities to about $38.8 [million], which is almost double …,” he said. “It does concern me as to how far we will obligate ourselves.”
Strausburg said the county would have a better idea of projected revenues in the coming weeks and how it would contribute to pay-go CIP funding.
“We are looking pretty good on our property tax revenues and I’m suggesting that our income tax rate will probably be flat to what we budgeted last year …,” he said. “I can’t really tell you at this moment how much pay-go could be covered by this coming operating year’s revenue and how much would have to come out.”
Councilman Joe Holloway questioned if the county should be concerned about projected income tax revenue.
“We have been, up until this year, increasing income tax [revenue] and now you are saying it’s going to be flat,” he said. “Isn’t that concerning about what we might see in the next year?”
Strausburg noted the projected income tax revenue for the coming year was a conservative estimate.
“I’d rather say that income taxes are going to be flat then to get myself out on a ledge and say, ‘well things are growing, and we are going to plan on continued growth,’” he said. “I’m not sure if that’s going to happen.”
Holloway then questioned why capital spending would increase.
“That doesn’t reflect on spending in the capital budget because it’s going up,” he said.
Strausburg noted he was working with each department to identify savings in the operating budget.
“I would rather that spending go towards one-time capital projects right now then to have it go towards recurring spending,” he said.
