The Washington County Board of Commissioners has rubber-stamped a hefty $2 billion budget for fiscal year 2025-26, effectively plugging a $20.5 million hole in the general fund and ensuring that county services, though slimmed down, keep pace with legal mandates, Washington County announced on Thursday. The budget, which faced public scrutiny on Tuesday, marks the fifth year the county has seen projected revenues and expenditures shuffling around trying to find a balance, all while population numbers in the Portland metro area have ticked steadily upward.
Chair of the Board, Kathryn Harrington, spoke on the bittersweet nature of the financial plan, stating, "We have a lot of cuts in personnel and in services. But we are an organization of more than 2,500 very dedicated public servants and we will persevere, and we will do so together." Harrington's remarks underscore a budget process fraught with decisions that axed funding to several key areas, including a $12 million slash to the Major Streets Transportation Improvement Program and the Washington County Cooperative Library Services, as well as a $7.1 million whittle-down of the public safety and justice bucket which comprised reductions in patrol and jail deputy positions, community corrections and child support services, systems generally funded through the general fund which gathers its substance largely from property taxes, however, Oregon's property tax system, with its constrained design, has left the county at odds with its fiscal needs and demands.
Investments in the county workforce and structural upgrades did catch some affirmative nods, including granting the 6% "PERS Pickup" to county employees not covered under a previous agreement and earmarking funds for the replacement of a nearly quarter-century-old enterprise resource planning tool. A new capital improvement plan has also set things in motion for sprucing up county infrastructure, with particular attention to public safety and technology systems, including funding for the Center for Addiction Triage, Treatment, and Training courtesy of diverse revenue streams.
On the flip side, the budget tightens straps with a 5% overall reduction from the revised 2024-25 figures, totaling a $104.3 million decrease, this tilt largely due to a shortfall in intergovernmental cash flowing to the Metro Supportive Housing Services program, which took a $76.4 million downturn, while strategic investments in the county's foundation, like transportation improvements and facility upgrades that accommodate the demands of a swelling populace and keep common spaces functioning, continue to carve out a segment of the pie, even as belt-tightening echoes through the fiscal plan.
