Budget Gap Closed; Revenue Could Come From Increased User Fees
Kane County was looking to close an $800,000 budget gap and might have found it if the County Board agrees to up some user fees.
According to a spreadsheet provided by Kane County Finance Executive Director Joe Onzick, the county could see additional revenue of $1,394,720 in fiscal year 2015 — assuming the total number of fees stays the same.
Onzick made a presentation at the 4 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 30,County Board Committee of the Whole meeting.
The nearly $1.4 million total added revenue breaks down to about $712,720 for the General Fund, $195,000 for the Geographic Information Systems Fund, $32,000 for the County Clerk’s Vital Records Automation Fund and $455,000 for the Recorder’s Office Automation Fund.
“The $800,000 budget gap that we were trying to close was a gap in the General Fund budget only,” Onzick explained in an email. “Therefore, it is really only the $712,720 of additional user fee revenue that impacts the General Fund that can be applied to closing the General Fund budget gap. So even after the $712,720 of additional user fee revenue, there still remained a gap of $87,280 that had to be closed with other cuts. Those additional cuts included the elimination of the request for an additional sheriff’s deputy ($70,903) and a $19,150 reduction in food cost for the adult correctional facility as a result of a new contract that was bid out.”
User fees generally would increase for services provided by the Kane County Sheriff’s Office, Kane County Recorder’s Office and GIS Department, County Clerk’s Office and the Animal Control division.
In early August, Kane County found itself facing a potential budget gap of $2,088,155. It whittled that down to $1,092,885 by Aug. 27, then to $795,911 by Sept. 1.
The county went looking for other ways to cut the budget gap and found it after doing a comparison of its user fees to the user fees charged by neighboring counties. It also did a deeper dive to determine the actual cost of providing each service, and in many cases found that a service costs more than the fee.
For example, mortgage lenders pay an $88 fee to process evictions, but the county spends about $125 to do the job.
Some of the user fees are small amounts, but a high percentage. A rabies tag replacement fee for the Animal Control Division would go from $1 now to a proposed $5 — an increase, obviously, of $4.
Others are smaller percentages. The user fee for a marriage or civil-union license would go up $5 — from $22 now to $ 27, if approved.
A Google document spreadsheet showing all the fees is embedded below. If you have trouble reading it, you can view the Google spreadsheet by clicking on this link.
Total County Increased User Fee Revenue for 2015 Budget
- Editor’s Note: This article is updated around 5:535 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 1, 2014, in order to provide additional numbers and clarification of the monies that go in each fund.
[…] draft budget estimates revenue conservatively, and instead aims to draw additional revenue from increases in user fees. It provides for a 2 percent salary increase, at managers’ discretion, for non-union […]
Interesting information. What I would like to hear from Kane County is what is being done to be more efficient. Using your example – mortgage lenders pay an $88 fee to process evictions, but the county spends about $125 to do the job. What are the details that make doing that cost $125? Is there process improvement work being done at every level to reduce waste and improve efficiency. That would be something worth Sharing and celebrating. Illinois has a dismal record for doing things that make people want to stay in Illinois. Raising Taxes, Raising fees are not helping the bigger cause. Please let us know what is happening on that side of the coin.
Thanks