By Ray King
Proposed Jefferson County budgets from County Judge Gerald Robinson and some members of the Quorum Court are separated by just over $275,000 after Robinson submitted a revised budget Friday.
That new budget is $37,053,869.77, almost $3-million more than the budget he initially presented early this month.
The budget submitted by seven members of the Quorum Court was $37,329,308.37. Looking at Robinson’s budget, the biggest changes were increases to the budget for the Sheriff, the Juvenile Justice Center and the Adult Jail.
The sheriff’s budget went from $2,399,011.21 to $2,462,556.15 while the budget for the Juvenile Detention Center increased from $1,964,7445.98 to $2,074,350.52. For the adult jail, the budget calls for $4,904,425.55, compared to the initially proposed figure of $2,953,647.42.
Robinson’s budget also calls for spending $189,000 on the lunch program at the juvenile detention center, which is funding by the state education department, $467,725.85 for the emergency vehicle program, and $357,581 for the Opioid reduction program.
Much of the difference between the two proposed budgets are increases for the offices of county officials.
Robinson is proposing $711,718.16 for the County Clerk while the JP’s are proposing $832,879.80. A significant part of that increase is a reported proposal to create a legislative clerk position in that office, a position reportedly to be filled by former JP Lloyd Franklin Jr., who lost a bid for reelection and left office Dec. 31.
The office of the circuit clerk was budgeted at $388,372.77 in Robinson’s budget while the JP’s budget was $423,517. The tax collector’s office would receive an increase from 4477,065 in Robinson’s budget to $532,554 from the JP’s budget and the Assessor’s Office would go from $644,385 in Robinson’s budget to $716,027 in the JP’s budget. The County Treasurer and Coroner would receive small increases.
Under the JP’s proposal, the sheriff would get $2,698,845.84, the juvenile detention center $2,115,701.57 and the adult jail $5,237,306.37. That budget also calls for small increases in the Treasurer’s Automation, Collector’s Automation and Recorder’s Cost Fund.
