No consensus about spending
Council approves additional appropriation for courthouse AC
By Debbie Lowe Staff writer

Brown

Faced with a possible lack of air flow in the courthouse very soon, Carroll County Council members had a difficult decision to make at their Friday morning special meeting. The news of the replacement and repair of the cooling system came soon after council members deduced a significant reduction in county reserves had occurred over the past four years.

There was no consensus among the six voting council members about when to remedy the air problem.

In a four-to-two vote, courthouse custodian Sheryl Shockley's request for a $32,875 additional appropriation was granted.

Jerry Hendress, Nancy Cripe, Ron Slavens and Carl Abbott voted to approve the additional out of the cumulative capital project fund. Steve Ashby and Ann Brown voted against the action.

"I know we have to do it," Brown said in a followup interview, "but with our unknown financial condition and until we get the state's

early audit results and we have more answers, I wasn't prepared to vote for it. It was my statement that we need to be more informed about our spending."

Ashby said he was present at the inspection one of the companies conducted in order to formulate their quote for the job. Ashby stressed the need for a comprehensive courthouse maintenance plan.

Ashby

"The reason I voted against spending cum cap money was because I think there was money in riverboat gambling we should have used instead," he told the Comet Monday. "In my opinion, we should have borrowed the money or taken it out of the riverboat money, but we weren't given that option."

"I'm not sure what we have in unrestricted funds, but I know we spent more money than we took in last year and I want to be sure this problem is fixed before we spend more money," he added.

After the appropriation vote, Brown asked council president Rob Baker if the issue of the budget reduction was going to be addressed at the meeting.

Baker responded the matter had been taken care of. County auditor Beth Myers said it was an auditor issue.

Director of budget division of the Department of Local Government Finance Bob Harris said Monday that counties are only given two weeks to rectify DLGF-imposed budget reductions. He said most Indiana counties manage the situation in the same manner Carroll County had.

"County officials did nothing wrong," he said.

Harris added the council can change line item amounts with council-initiated transfers if they do not agree with the amended figures submitted to DLGF. He said that action would come after their formal review of the adjusted budget.

The next council meeting is Friday, April 27, at 8 a.m.