(Spirit Lake)– There’s growing concern among local governmental entities over the potential impacts the COVID-19 pandemic may be having on their budgets. The issue came up at Tuesday’s Dickinson County Board of Supervisors meeting. Supervisor Tim Fairchild requested the matter be put on the agenda for further discussion at their next meeting…
“I wonder if we should make it a point to talk about that, like maybe at our next meeting. Just to make sure that we have some sort of plan of attack as far as what we can and cannot do. I mean if this thing goes on we could lose $300,000 or whatever it was in hotel-motel receipts to the county; we could lose road use tax, driving is down 50 percent. So it wouldn’t hurt for us to have the discussion, I think.”
County Engineer Dan Eckert expressed some concern at Tuesday’s meeting regarding a downward slide in Road Use Tax revenue and the impacts it could have on road construction projects…
“Road use tax funds are way, way down and so we’ve started tightening the belt a little bit. But yes, hopefully this all passes and we’re back to a fairly normal situation.”
Fellow Supervisors agreed with Fairchild in taking another look at the county’s budget, adding it’s much better to be proactive instead of reactive.
