By Mary Alice Murphy

With no public input at the beginning of the May 21, 2024 Grant County Commission special meeting, Planning Director Randy Hernandez brought up a previously tabled item for consideration under new business.

Hernandez explained the recommendation to apply for funding from the New Mexico Administrative Office of the Courts (NMAOC) for a grant for planning and design of a renovation of the County Courthouse as well as a second option to construct a new courthouse.

"We would ask an architect to include both the options in a planning and design document to be ready for the potential of future funding for the work," Hernandez said. "Then you will decide which option the county will choose to seek funding for."

District 3 Commissioner Alicia Edwards asked where the 50 percent match of the grant will come from.

Grant County Manager Charlene Webb said her recommendation from the prior meeting was that it would come from the county funds or from the LATCF (Local Assistance and Tribal Consistency Fund). "But once we had the budget for fiscal year 2025 done, it shows we have enough county funding to do the match. Once we have the planning and design document done, we will have a shovel-ready project. But then, coming up with the 50 percent match for either an about $8-$10 million renovation project or an up to $20 million new construction will be more difficult."

She explained the drawings in the commissioners' packets were the result of the needs assessment that had been done.

Sixth Judicial District Chief Judge Jarod Hofacket said the money available from the AOC this year was $10 million, half of last year's state allocation, to be split up among all applicants. "I recommend you apply for the planning and design and let them know you will also asking for legislative funding for the project you choose."

Edwards pointed out that if the decision is to build new, the county will have to come up with the 50 percent match of about $10 million. "If the Legislature doesn't allocate enough, would the county have to come up with the rest?"

Hofacket said he didn't think the judiciary would stop the county from seeking other funding sources for the 50 percent match.

He noted that the New Mexico Supreme Court has laid out their budget priorities and "security is one of them. The wording is a bit difficult, because it says the courts will fund up to 50 percent and the county up to 50 percent. It is not clear whether the county might have to put in more than 50 percent."

Hofacket said he didn't think the courts will use their entire allocation for one courthouse project and the 50 percent cost for a new courthouse would take this year's entire allocation.

Edwards expressed concern that the Legislature has a propensity to push the extra costs onto the county rather than allocating a larger state allocation. "I think the judiciary and the county agree on the priority of security, but our job is to convince the legislative body, which will allocate the money, that it is necessary."

Hofacket said up to two years ago, the judicial funding was not even available. "The costs of a courthouse up to that time were 100 percent the responsibility of the county."

Edwards said it is not fair to put that financial responsibility on counties with limited resources, "which is probably why we are so behind in security and other issues."

District 4 Commissioner Harry Browne asked if the judicial districts prepare ICIPs (infrastructure capital improvement plans) and apply for capital outlay from the Legislature.

Hofacket said, as far as he knows, it has not been done because of the statute requiring the counties to carry the financial responsibility for the courthouses. "It's very hard for one branch of government to lobby and pay for the responsibility of another branch of government."

He noted the change in funding had come about because of an ongoing dispute between the judiciary and another county. "We don't have that problem here, but I think the legislature and judiciary realized it is an unfunded mandate."

District 1 Commissioner and Chair Chris Ponce said he was taken aback when at the legislature he heard from one county that they were seeking money for the courthouse. "No one had approached us to advocate for the funding. It might be good for you to have an ICIP list, which would let us know, so we could advocate for other entities, too. It would be nice to know, so we could join forces and help you advocate for your funding."

Edwards thanked Hofacket for the background.

Webb said the action would be a resolution later in the agenda.

Deputy County Manager Andrea Montoya presented the budget adjustment requests. Commissioners approved the BARs.

Next came the resolution on the preliminary budget for fiscal year 2025. Webb led the discussion. She said she had sent the draft of the preliminary budget and "that's what you have in front of you today. I will discuss only the three major funds. The projected cash balances are based on revenues and expenditures to date, as of May 15."

The cash balance of the General Fund as of mid-May stands at $7,347,634.91. She noted investments of $18,574,808 are not included in the cash balance. Projected budgeted total transfers equal -$4,525,446.42; projected revenue of $18,972,171; budgeted expenses of $13,481,506.19; an estimated ending cash balance of $8,312,853.30; required reserves of $4,470,375.55, leaving an adjusted ending cash balance of $4,942,476.75.

Webb said the county provided a detailed budget list to the commissioners. "What we did with the General Fund, the Road Department and Corrections, we took the presentations you heard from the department heads. The changes we made were moving all the capital outlay requests into the LATCF fund, so there wasn't an impact to those three major funds. Some other adjustments were made based on actual expenditures and actual revenues."

She said what she presented did not include any of the grants, "which was a challenge because it doesn't align enough. We have some balances we are carrying forward for many, many years. So what I've done is we have compiled all the grants and their active balances, which we will roll over to fiscal year 2025. Those are compiled according to LGBMS (Local Government Budget Management System)."

Browne expressed surprise at the reserves and adjusted cash balance and wondered if that would be the same in the final budget.

Webb said she believes both will be lower in the final budget, because "this doesn't reflect 100 percent of the transfers. We did a huge amount of the work now, because moving into the final budget, we will be dealing with actual final cash balances. We will have the transfers nailed down. We will continue to update you as we move along. Another thing I discovered was, you may remember the GRT (gross receipts tax) restructure in 2019, which freed up several increments of GRT. We had a bunch of little buckets of GRT that we got to put into two big buckets for general purposes. That did not happen, so one of the ones that was difficult to explain was the fire excise tax. The other one is environmental GRT. It gives us the flexibility to use them for general fund purposes. This doesn't match the LGBMS, so we will likely have to work with maybe an external auditor and DFA (Department of Finance Administration). It will be my intent to continue to monitor them internally, but they are not required to be in the funds and we have not used the flexibility. It's been a challenge."

Ponce said he gets questions about the Detention Center.

Webb said right now they are showing a current beginning cash balance in Corrections of $164,710.78, which she said would be zeroed out because there is no need for a beginning cash balance. "We are projecting transfers in of $2,699,364.22, with budgeted revenue of $1,273,100.00, with budgeted expenses of $4,137,175. We are not required to carry any amount of reserves for Corrections."

She then presented the Road Fund budget. The projected beginning cash balance stands at $33,818.33, with budgeted transfers in of $986,101.00, fiscal year 2024 budgeted revenue of $1,045,850, budgeted expenses of $1,906,864.00, leaving an estimated required reserve of $158,905.33, with an estimated ending balance of zero. because of the required reserves. "Because we transfer in from the General Fund, there is no need for a carryover amount."

She said there is still a lot of work to do for the final budget, "but it's minor compared to what we've done so far. Removing a lot of the balances that we were carrying over, really cleaned up things and made it clearer and easier to look at."

Browne had a question on the fire funds.

Webb said she separated out the state fire funds for each department, because it has different rules for how it can be spent. A separate Fire Protection Fund has what the departments had prior to consolidating the funding into one county fire fund, totaling about $2.6 million, which can be used for matching funds and such. She also has separate state funds for each fire department, which has each department's request to the state, and is an estimate of what allotments they will receive this year. She noted that a couple of new department chiefs are working really hard to get their departments built back up, including needed equipment and apparatuses. "We broke them out where we have local funds in one fund and state ones in another."

Browne also asked about the LATCF fund. "It seems you put capital outlay funds in there."

"Yes," Webb said. "If you look at the budgeted expenses line, there is $1.7 million in there. That was requested during your budget workshop, so I shifted it all into LATCF. Some of that can be whittled down. I think there may have been more wants than need,s but we can shift it out. It would be my preference that we have no transfers out of it into other funds, and then budget what we need out of that, so for accounting purposes we can see exactly what we spent out of it."

She also noted that the opioid settlement funding is waiting for a commission decision. "I did not budget any of that, and we need a discussion about what we want to do with it, hopefully after the fiscal year starts."

Ponce asked the sheriff where he is on biannual training. Sheriff Villanueva said the department would be starting a new biannual training schedule. He noted that a lot of training can be done online, which saves the county money. "My preference is, if we need it that we bring a trainer here and get all the local law enforcement trained. Fortunately, the LEPF (law enforcement protection fund) was raised, so I'm using as much of that as possible to save on county costs."

Edwards said to Webb: "I know a lot of heartache went into this, but it's so much easier to read, so thank you."

Browne made a motion to approve the preliminary budget and District 2 Commissioner Eloy Medina seconded it. Commissioners approved the preliminary budget.

The next resolution considered authorizing the submission of an application to the New Mexico Administrative Officer of Courts for Grant County Courthouse project. Edwards moved and Medina seconded, after Webb said this was authorization to submit, but the application would include both projects - renovation or build new. Commissioners approved the resolution.

Under commissioner reports, Medina said he visited the 4-H shooting practice. "These kids are amazing. I talked to the coaches, watched the kids shooting and these kids are really committed to the program. I want to say to Jessica (Swapp-Massengill, County Agent) thank you for the 4-H program and what she is doing with these kids. I will be taking Jessica with me to our next session in Mimbres on June 12, as well as taking the new county fire chief (Roger Groves). I invite the community to attend and ask questions."

Edwards had no report.

Browne congratulated the schools for a successful graduation and the Silver City Museum for a successful Burlesque Baseball. "The sheriff was an ace out there with the Gordos."

Ponce had a comment for the county manager. "I know you're really busy right now. I did receive an email about the Wildlife Services contract. Is there any way to use the unspent money in the contract for public education?"

Webb said she would have to go back and look at the statute. "We fund a lot of it through Taylor grazing fees, and the statute is very specific about what the funds can be used for. We've also been carrying over a balance. I think that is unnecessary and we should only be transferring the amount necessary to fund that program. We allocate the funds and we transfer them into the fund, so I think that's a conversation you will have to have with Mr. Fajardo (the head of the office in Las Cruces). We are paying for the wildlife services portion, so we don't really have a lot of flexibility on how those dollars are used. I'm not sure I agree with Mr. Griffin's assessment that the full hours are not being utilized. I'll follow up after I go back and refresh my memory on the statute."

Meeting adjourned.