Linda Harris BUDGET TALKS — Jefferson County Auditor E.J. Conn said department heads need to understand how important it is for them to hold the line on "baking permanent costs" into their budgets this year.

STEUBENVILLE — Jefferson County finalized its 2026 budget Monday, but made it clear officials weren’t happy about it.

Auditor E.J. Conn told commissioners the general fund spending plan for 2026 totals just under $25,542,533. The overall budget, which includes all non-general funds — primarily tax revenue remitted to other taxing authorities — totaled $152,956,804 this year.

“It’s been a long budget year, but we got through it,” Conn said. “But this year, we’re going to need to cut back departmental budgets going into 2027. If the departments spend exactly what they asked for this year, we’ll be left with a carryover at the end of the year of $2,573,000, so there’s going to have to be some cutbacks going into 2027. But I think we all knew that.”

Commissioner Tony Morelli said it “seems like we had this same conversation last year, and we’re still here, a day or two before the budget needs balanced.”

“It will be interesting to see how much is carried over this year, because there were certain departments that wouldn’t, didn’t, or said they couldn’t cut back at all,” Morelli said. “And this is what we end up with. It will be interesting to see the carryover in those departments.”

Conn said he thinks they “need to start meeting with department heads now to kind of lay the groundwork in terms of how we’re going to move forward.”

“Cuts are going to be necessary — it’s not going to be an option,” he said. “So I think we’ve got to start that process early. That way, we have a chance to kind of rein in spending.”

Commissioner Jake Kleineke pointed out the county was hit with a $1.4 million price increase for employee health insurance, saying they’re “shopping around” now for relief.

“We’re not unique in that circumstance,” Conn replied. “We actually received a call from another county last week that’s in a worse position than we are in terms of health care, so it’s happening across the state. They went from what was like a double-digit carryover — about $10 million — down to $3 million.”

He said Jefferson County, by comparison, started the 2026 budget process with a cash carryover of $8.95 million. The final budget exceeds general fund revenues by $6.4 million, so if department heads spend it all — which Conn concedes they normally don’t — they’d have just $2.573 million to carry over into 2027.

He also pointed out health care costs aren’t solely to blame for the county’s shaky financial footing.

“Costs are going up across the board, and revenue is declining,” he said.

Conn said they can’t tell department heads when to grant raises or whether one is warranted.

“Each department head handles that in-house,” he said.

“But it comes back down here right to us, and it says, ‘Here’s your mess,'” Morelli replied.

“What you control — your authority — is to appropriate funds,” Conn replied. “That’s how you can control that. You can’t control the timing of raises, but I would caution other elected officials to kind of keep it in mind and try not to bake permanent costs into future budgets, whether that’s hiring, wage increases, or other unnecessary costs. They need to be mindful of that going into 2027.”

Commissioner Jake Kleineke said department heads need to understand, “It’s their ship to steer, but if it’s affecting the fleet, it’s a problem.”

“Your control is that appropriation,” Conn reiterated. “So if you don’t feel raises are appropriate next year, don’t appropriate enough money to allow them to give raises.”

He said they’ll be sending out “letters for the 2027 budget” in April.

“We could put into that letter that they should wait until they have an approved budget before they give any wage increase,” he said.

Conn also suggested meeting with department heads “ahead of time” to make sure they understand the gravity of the situation.

Commissioners, meanwhile, thanked the department heads who heeded their plea to trim budget requests by 7.5% to preserve as much carryover money as possible — among them the sheriff’s department, prosecutor’s office, the law library, and the soil and water conservation district.

“We’re not in a dire position,” Commissioner Eric Timmons said. “We do have a carryover. I just think there are some things we have to work on to get where we need to be. It seems like it goes in cycles, so we’ve just got to get to that mentality of thinking it right. I do appreciate the department heads putting their efforts into this, so we’ll just move on to next year.”