Linn County’s path to hiring resiliency coordinator uncertain after cutting $1.7 million in fiscal 2024 spending

CEDAR RAPIDS — Linn County still has no clear path for funding a new resiliency coordinator role after settling on spending reductions in the 2024 fiscal year to fill a $1.74 million gap from a bill correcting a state error that left local governments down millions in expected revenue.

The three-member Board of Supervisors settled Wednesday on discretionary spending cuts to travel, training, vehicles, vacancies and several grant programs for the budget that runs July 1 through June 30, 2024.

Conservation and Secondary Roads will see their general fund transfers reduced by $205,142 each. The reduced funding means there would be less money available to treat trail surfaces and buy the rock used to surface about two-thirds of county roads.

The county also is pulling out of its $23,030 contribution for Kirkwood Workplace Learning Connection and its $50,000 contribution to the Creating Safe, Equitable and Thriving Communities task force, which works to identify the root causes of gun violence and develop strategies to address them. Linn County, Cedar Rapids and the Cedar Rapids Community School District contributions helped establish the SET Fund in 2018.

Supervisor Ben Rogers had suggested keeping a $25,000 contribution as a symbolic commitment of the county, but said Greater Cedar Rapids Community Foundation officials assured programming would not be affected by the funding loss.

“I left that in there both understanding the reality but also that former Supervisor Stacey Walker was instrumental to this task force,” Rogers said. “That demonstrates still a commitment to its mission in reducing gun violence.”

After arriving at $1.74 million in proposed spending cuts, Supervisor Kirsten Running-Marquardt asked if the board would be willing to increase the amount of reductions to free about $88,000 to hire the resiliency coordinator within the Sustainability Department. She had identified $1.833 million in reductions, going beyond the needed sum to reduce because of the state rollback error.

Running-Marquardt and Supervisor Louie Zumbach in January voted to keep the federal American Rescue Plan Act money with the Sustainability Department, but restricted it from being used to hire a new employee.

That was after the board, when former Supervisor Stacey Walker was in Running-Marquardt’s seat, approved $363,389 toward the Sustainability Department to fund operations and the hiring of a resiliency coordinator for three years.

“I believed it was a better idea at the time to move it to the general budgeting process for the long term,” Running-Marquardt said.

Her goal with this move was to give the department an influx of money to use on programming, while still funding the role — supporting both additional personnel and activities within the department. But she disagreed with using one-time money to fund an ongoing personnel expense.

Supervisor Ben Rogers, who opposed the move in January, replied that “it was funded through ARPA” until the vote Jan. 9.

After the meeting, Running-Marquardt told The Gazette, “the resiliency coordinator funded in the regular budgeting process still remains a priority of mine. I will continue to look to find ways in the proper regular budgeting process to fund that position.”

If supervisors make amendments to the fiscal 2024 budget, those couldn’t be done until the start of the budget year after July 1.

The supervisors may convene again March 10 to restore some of the reductions if Iowa lawmakers pass House File 344, a bill affecting fees related to the registration and titling of motor vehicles. Budget Director Sara Bearrows said the county estimates it would get $1 million in revenue from that legislation.

Rogers agreed the county could explore the other aforementioned options to fund the position, but said it’s unfortunate because the role had been funded.

But in his view, Running-Marquardt didn’t make a formal motion for higher spending reductions to be discussed and there was ultimately a unanimous vote to approve the final dollar amount of reductions at $1,743,750.

“She said it was her top priority,” Rogers said. “You just need to convince one other person that your idea is worthy on a three-member board.”

Zumbach asked if some departments were later moved or changed, whether that money could be moved to other areas later in the budgeting process. Bearrows said that could be done through budget amendments.

While supervisors discussed the resiliency coordinator role, Zumbach began to say, “If we were willing to sit down after we get done with this and redesign the department,” but did not elaborate on his thoughts. He declined to comment further after the meeting.

Overall, he said the collaborative nature of the budget reductions process was “a win for Linn County.”

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