The future forecast for Thurston County’s budget shows a chance of significant deficits in the near future if the county doesn’t evaluate containment and revenue options.
Summer Miller, the county’s budget and finance manager, presented a quarterly budget update to the Board of County Commissioners during a work session Wednesday, Feb. 26. Even with the commissioners’ 2024 budget recommendations, the cash flow forecast for the general fund appears bleak.
With the recommended funding actions, the projected year-end fund balance for the 2024 fiscal year, which has not yet been closed, is $26,624,000. Based on the county’s current approach, the balance would drop to $16,511,000 in 2025 and down to $4,434,000 in 2026 before reaching the negatives at the end of the 2027 fiscal year.
Many of the charts that Miller presented showed expenditures far outpacing revenue in future years.
“In a very not-too-distant future in 2027, we flatline the fund balance and then we go into the negative, which you can’t operate there,” County Manager Leonard Hernandez said. “The revenue isn’t performing at the anticipated amount. It was down coming out of 2024, and we were reducing the forecast or the anticipated amount and it was still underperforming or flat. It’s just not going to keep pace with expenses at the current rate.”
Miller showed the commissioners an exercise where a 10% reduction in county expenditures would prevent projected shortfalls through at least 2034 but would still come with a limited general fund balance.
“Nothing that we are presenting to you is any way an indication of the budget teams wanting to sway decisions. It’s just to give you the most factual, up-to-date information in as close to real time as we possibly can,” Miller told the commissioners. “In our next steps, we will be reviewing our revenue options and budget containment, and we’re hoping that we might have another one soon after that to round up some more ideas.”
Commissioner Wayne Fournier said he doesn’t believe the county should lead with finding revenue options and rather should focus its efforts on budget containment.
“When I’ve gone out and talked to some of our stakeholders and talked about the importance of finding revenue opportunities, they’re all almost removed from the budget process. There’s not that scrappy attitude that they need to find those opportunities for themselves,” he said. “I’m hoping that changes with these kind of dismal forecasts, but I really think that budget containment needs to be put before anything else in our discussions and then the revenue stuff comes second.”
