The Summit County Council had a long discussion Wednesday about how their budget and revenues are affected by the COVID-19 outbreak and the subsequent lockdowns.
But Council Chair Doug Clyde said at this point, they’re still facing a lot of unknowns about what the summer and fall will bring.
The council heard from their Chief Financial Officer Matt Leavitt, about the hit their revenues took during that March-to-May period. But he said they don’t know if they’re facing a worst-case scenario yet.
“What we were talking about yesterday was, look, okay, we finally got a little glimpse of what the actual data is. And the actual data for the month of, the last couple weeks of March and early April was very bad, depending on whether you were looking at lodging tax or restaurant tax. We were off in the order of 40 to 50 percent. We don’t believe that that’s the way we’re going to be for the balance of the summer. But at this point, we don’t know.”
Meanwhile, re-opened Main Street merchants have reported sales in recent weeks nearly comparable with the previous year, and their first car-less Sunday on Main was apparently a success.
Clyde said they’re happy to hear that.
“That’s great, and we hope they can build on that. But again, that’s a brief window of hope. We can pair that against a very brief glimpse of absolute despair. So the answer probably lies somewhere in the middle.”
The Council approved two rounds of cuts to the 2020 budget in the spring. Clyde said they don’t expect any further changes until budget-setting for 2021 this winter.
But their posture at this time is to be very careful.
“We’re looking at delaying most significant capital projects to the extent that they can be. We’ve had a hiring freeze since a little bit after, well, after the first signs of COVID hit. And we’ve also got wages frozen, and are looking judiciously at all departments and all budgets.”
We asked how much they might dip into the county’s current fund balances. Clyde said their answer at this time is “Just enough but not too much.”
“Again, we don’t have hard answers. We know we have those reserves, and there are other reserves out there as well. But for right now, we just know that we need to be extremely cautious.”
He also said it’s not the Council’s intent right now to dip into the tax stability fund (or “rainy day fund”). A vote of the people is required to take out of the principal in that fund.
“The purpose of the fund is a little bit multi-faceted. But it is, among other things, designed to help out during disasters. Or alternatively, you build the fund up and you use the interest from that fund to augment your spending on an annual basis. But yeah, so it’s out there. Our intention is not to dip into it. We certainly will if we have to.”
Summit County Council Chair Doug Clyde.
