Overall county finances actually see improvement

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Overall county finances actually see improvement

Posted by

Susan Norman

in Top Stories & Breaking News, Winder Archives

Friday, October 1. 2010

Comments (14)

Minutes before the Barrow County Board of Commissioners approved more layoffs Tuesday, it learned that the county’s financial picture has significantly improved.

Department managers and elected officials apparently heeded the urgent warnings of the county’s new CFO, who in July called for a freeze on all non-payroll spending other than for emergencies.

As a result of the belt-tightening and more revenue than expected,Rose Kisaalita in a presentation to the Barrow County Board of Commissioners on Tuesday night reduced by $1 million her estimate of the projected deficit for FY2010.

In mid July she projected the shortfall at the end of the fiscal year on Sept. 30 would be $1.5 million. Instead, she said she expects it to be about $545,000.

The good news: That would salvage more than $4.1 million in the county’s reserve funds, which only two months ago were expected to drop to $3.1 million.

“That is the best figure since we started having these projections,” Kisaalita said. “And I am hoping at end of September that that figure will get even better.”

The bottom line could improve further, because Kisaalita has projected another $3.6 million in spending by the end of the fiscal year, but departments only spent $2.3 million in August.

The major factors in the better outlook for the fiscal year’s bottom line are increased sales tax revenues, increased sales of capital assets, and solid revenue collections elsewhere.

For more on this story, see the September 29 edition of the Barrow Journal or click here to read the full story online when you subscribe to our new e-edition.

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#1 DuWayne Anderson on 10/01/10 at 09:27 AM [Reply]

Susan,
Saved $1 million dollars with belt tightening????
Are you serious??? Something isn't right in BOC finance land..... I would like the specifics on how this was done, not the usual fluff answers! Which depts., and how much in each. Who was responsible for the savings??
When projections are off by that much, CFO should be audited. Either she can't project future expenditures, or someone has missed something on the balance sheet, or revenue taken in! We need specifics on this. Million dollar swings in revenue just don't show up all of a sudden. If the county can save that much in a few months based on CFO projections, I wonder what we have been spending our money on for the last 2 years???? Maybe Danny has some answers..................
Sincerely,
DuWayne R. Anderson
Winder, GA

#1.1 Danny has no answers on 10/01/10 at 10:24 AM [Reply]

Some months ago , I told everyone exactly what was going on. The powers that be, were lying to us about the fortunes of barrow county. I said then,and say again now it was all so that they could raise our taxes,actually have the people stand up and say, raise our taxes. This is what they have wanted all along, more public money for their friends and "investments". Yearwood and crowd have used this "economic downturn" to wage war on the taxpayers.
You all should have listened to ol jack legg when you had a chance,now its too late,the poor dumb citizenry have once again been slicked by the politicians.
If you gat a chance to think about it , just remember that Jack Legg told ya so and you didnt listen to him.

#1.1.1 DuWayne Anderson on 10/01/10 at 03:53 PM [Reply]

If JL had the answers prior to this new financial bombshell, then he should have gotten on the agenda for one of the budget meetings to confront the entire BOC in person and demand specific answers from chairman Yearwood or had the CFO explain it out in the open. Further, if he tried to get on the agenda and was denied without explanation, then he should have spoken up in local blogs, or one of the newspapers. Taking credit for "knowing about something" after the fact, is not a sign of strong leadership, but more of a personal political agenda.(i.e. running for BOE Chair in 2012.) Unless JL is an employee of the BOC/finance dept. or other entity, or a relative of same, he has no better inside info than anyone else in Barrow County.
Sincerely,
DuWayne R. Anderson
Winder, GA

#1.1.1.1 Jack Legg on 10/02/10 at 10:39 AM [Reply]

Gee, Duh Wayne, I spoke up on "one of the local blogs" multiple times telling you big dummies what yearwood and crowd were up to. Not only did you ignore me then , but you and a few other know it alkls went to trashing me because you didnt like my spelling or my writing ability.
The egg, my friend is on your face.No one who reads the "local blogs" can truly say that they weren't warned by me.
I cant go up to the commishioers meeting and be out on the agenda due to my job and the negative connotations that would come upon me if I did.
As far as Im concerned with this ,you and my other attackers on the blog sites are like the folks in the intelligence community before 9-11 who suppressed reports that terrorists might seize airplanes and fly them into buildings.Then afterward got on tv and poo pooed that no one could have known.

Rest easy in the bed you have made.

#1.2 Jacquelin Twiss on 10/01/10 at 06:15 PM [Reply]

I hate to say this, but I'm with DuWayne on this one.

I'd like to see the ratio of revenues to "belt tightening".

#2 Wheels on 10/01/10 at 06:07 PM [Reply]

WOW, wish I could fine $$$ like that in our household, budget. What's the trick???

#3 no trick, just a lack of knowledge on 10/02/10 at 07:56 AM [Reply]

The CFO is new and doesn't understand the complexity of our County finances. Next year and the year after she will do much better anticipating our actual revenue and expense.

But there is absolutely no excuse for our Commissioners not understanding our finances in detail.

There should never a million dollar surprise in either direction...positive or negative!

We need the "real" facts on how this happened, or it will just happen again.

#3.1 What ???? on 10/02/10 at 04:25 PM [Reply]

So what you’re saying is the CFO that negotiated/demanded a $7000.00 pay raise probably didn’t deserve it. As I’ve said several times when someone hired for her position makes multiple million dollar accounting mistakes not only should she have not gotten the raise but probably not the job. Furthermore this county is long over due for an IRS audit. After the IRS completes their audit the indictments could begin.

#4 Just a thought! on 10/02/10 at 09:29 AM [Reply]

With things like they are do we need a CFO that is in training?

#5 Anonymous on 10/02/10 at 01:14 PM [Reply]

1 of 3 things could explain this:

1. The CFO was given misinformation - happened in the past and she caught it. This time maybe she didn't

2. She doesn't know what she's doing

3. She knowingly withheld numbers from the budget. Didn't the last CFO NOT include information on (if memory serves correctly) health care benefit cost AT the request of the prior board/chairman?

#6 Phil on 10/02/10 at 08:48 PM [Reply]

As long as this BOC stays in power we can not attract any companies or jobs to grow our tax base. Its not even about who is right and who is wrong anymore. I don't care who's fault it is. The fact is this BOC is killing all chances to attract jobs here. The only question is how do we get companies to come here regardless of the failed BOC. Like them or not the BOC have failed us. They have failed to hold taxes down, failed to grow our tax base and failed to hold us above all personal conflicts. They as a group HAVE FAILED THE TAX PAYERS OF BARROW COUNTY. Once the people in Barrow Co comes to this conclusion as a group then and only then can we go to the BOC as a group and demand our issues to be listened to. We can take our county and BOC back but it will take us finally coming together as a county and crash their BOC meetings and demand they hear us. It worked when the airport group went there ... they were heard. Ask the people voted out if a mad mob can't hurt you. We must come together as a large group and take back our county. Is there anyone out there that is willing to demand more for your money?

#7 hmmm on 10/03/10 at 10:15 PM [Reply]

don't think she adds well, I f i made those kind of mistakes i would have lost my job.

#7.1 Hugo Klenyen on 10/04/10 at 12:28 PM [Reply]

It’s obvious that the proper use of grammar and punctuation isn’t part of your job, either...

#8 DuWayne R. Anderson on 10/04/10 at 02:44 PM [Reply]

Ladies and Gentlemen,
In the interest of fairness to the taxpayers of Barrow County and the Commissioners, I suggest an independent and complete financial audit of the Barrow County financial dept.,by the state of Georgia. Worth the cost of finding out what the budget really is. Million dollar swings in projected revenue balances demand it. No one on the BOC should have a problem with this if there is nothing to be uncovered, and everything is above board as I am sure it is...............
DuWayne

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