photo by Scott Mims

Gina Abbott of Maplesville pays a fee at the Chilton County Probate Office while her sons, Aidan (on counter) and Jackson look on.

Departments taxed by cuts

By Scott Mims (Contact) | Clanton Advertiser

Published Thursday, July 30, 2009

Editor’s note: The following is the second in a series of stories looking at the financial state of the Chilton County Commission and county departments. The first story appeared Wednesday, July 29.

At the end of each business day, the clerks of the Chilton County Probate Office close the windows through which they serve customers. But lately, one window remains closed all the time.

This is because the probate office employs one less full-time clerk due to recent budget cuts. Not only is there one less clerk, but also one less operating computer. This leaves one machine per clerk — provided that the other computers remain operational.

“We didn’t have the money to replace it,” said Chilton County Probate Judge Bobby Martin. “If another one went down, we wouldn’t have a backup.”

To save money, the office has stopped mailing out boat tag reminders. And according to Martin, the additional revenue gained from increased data processing fees — up from $2 to $5 per transaction — doesn’t help much.

The department really had to slash its budget twice this fiscal year — once at the beginning of the year and again in April when the County Commission mandated across-the-board 8-percent cuts. The department’s total budget was $338,817.04.

The 8-percent was applied to remaining funds, not the original amount budgeted for the fiscal year. These cuts totaled $17,205.92.

“We cut slightly more than 8 percent,” Chief Probate Clerk Mary Chambers said. “That’s closer to 9 or 10 percent.”

Travel, training and supplies were the biggest areas for reductions.

“We’ve put it back into next year’s budget, but we cut it for this year,” said Martin, who for the first time in 20 years is not attending the statewide training conference for probate judges.

Martin says the information gathered at such conferences is valuable to both department heads and their employees.

“After the Legislature meets, they add laws and take away laws. That’s what they discuss at those meetings,” he said.

Like all department heads, Martin is looking for another barebones budget next year that could be even tighter.

Down the hallway, Chilton County Tax Assessor Tom Powers is preparing to turn over his office to newly elected Tax Assessor Rex Cleckler, who will take office Oct. 1.

To help fund the transition, Powers returned to his original budget when submitting a proposed budget for Fiscal Year 2009-2010.

“We’ve been able to scrape and move some money and get things set up for the coming year,” he said. “Ad valorem taxes are basically at a standstill right now. We had less than 1 percent growth in that.”

While revenues are way down, Powers added that due to the lack of sales, he has seen no decrease in land value.

“We’re still holding our own,” he said.

The tax assessor’s total budget for 2008-09 was $182,000. The reappraisal budget, which includes mapping and personal property, was $508,000. The reappraisal budget was not affected by the commission’s cuts.

Powers did cut $7,200 from the assessor’s budget, mostly in the form of training and supplies. He did attend the Association of Tax Assessors conference in June, but it cost him $1,200 out of his own pocket.

“The reason I went was I felt there were a lot of things coming up in the state I needed to know and let Rex know for the coming year,” he said.

Powers suggested that before county officials look for new revenue sources, they should try to collect taxes that aren’t getting paid.

“We have lots of taxes out there. There are some we are unable to collect for various reasons, and it’s hard to tie those taxes down. If we could collect what’s owed to us, it might be surprising what tax money’s out there.”

Powers said perhaps the county should expand its revenue departments rather than cut them.

“We’re supposed to have one appraiser for every 9,000 parcels. We have two for 28,000 parcels,” he said.

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