The county Board of Supervisors will join with their peers across the state to oppose Senate Bill 1411 which is said to weaken county authority over budgets and to appeal to legislators to consider no further cuts to state revenue sharing.

County supervisors from across Arizona expressed alarm over proposed legislation that weakens their authority over county budgets which could erode public oversight over the spending of county tax dollars, said Supervisor Pat Call.

Senate Bill 1411 would remove the ability of the county boards of supervisors to oversee the budgets of county elected officials, including sheriffs, attorneys, assessors, treasurers, recorders, justices of the peace and clerks of the court, he explained. All the supervisors would be required to do is approve the budgets of those officials.

Call explained that many county departments depend on each other.

For example, the IT Department serves all county departments. If an elected official decided that a new software system would work well for them, it may not mesh with the county’s network and costs could be incurred to pay for the system, installation and then maintenance. “It throws efficiency out the window. This is just political maneuvering in the largest counties whose elected officials can’t get along. We get along fine in Cochise County. “

The legislation as stated would also require counties with 350,000 or more residents to give elected officials’ their budget money via lump sums.

“That’s a slippery slope,” added Call. “If the state can do that to the most populated counties now, they could do that to all of us.”

The county has been striving to be more efficient with fewer employees. “This flies in the face of more efficient government.”

Supervisor Richard Searle said, “It makes no sense. There’d be no power for the supervisors to protect the tax payers.”

Call continued, “Contrary to what some have claimed, this legislation is a significant departure from the way counties have been governed since our state was founded nearly 100 years ago.

Although county elected officials and supervisors sometimes have disagreements over funding, those are best settled at the local level based on what’s best for the county and its residents.”

Senate Bill 1411 was passed by the Senate Government Reform Committee on Feb. 16 and will next be considered by a vote of the full Senate.

State legislators may also cut even more revenues to counties as they try to fund the budget deficit, according to CSA’s legislative associate Rodney Ross. In an interview, he said state legislators, led by Sen. Andy Biggs (R-District 22), are mulling the possibility of cutting an additional $100 million to $150 million to counties. “The county impact in the proposed GOP budget appears to be nearly equivalent to what counties have absorbed in the previous three years combined. To date, counties have absorbed $193 million in impacts since 2008.”

Ross said CSA does not know exactly where the cuts to counties will be made at this point. “We just sent out the alert in response to information we received from lawmakers. Right now, we don’t have any specifics.”

Ross points out that shifting costs to counties does not reduce spending. It just shifts costs to the county tax payer.

“CSA is extremely concerned that this proposal, including its county impacts, may rapidly gain headway unless state lawmakers are informed of the consequences of shifts on counties. This would have an incredible impact on counties �” one they cannot sustain.”

Searle believes that ultimately, the tax payers will pay for it one way or the other. This only shifts state responsibility to the county. It’ll be on our backs”

There has been much hand-wringing over the proposed elimination of Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System or at least trimming between 250,000 and 280,000 people from the rolls, added Searle. “We pay the state $8 million for AHCCCS and we get back $15 million. Who’ll make that money up? What services will we have to cut? Do we cut law enforcement, the court system, the jail? Where do we cut?”

Over the past three years, the county has had to deal with several million dollars in cuts from the state that have led to drastic belt-tightening, as has been reported in the Herald/Review. Department budgets have decreased more than 25 percent over the past three years and staff has been reduced from nearly 1,100 full-time positions to 955.