Open Space 2006 Budget

For the last few years, preparing the Open Space budget could be considered easy from one perspective and difficult from another. The years prior to 1999 had shown 6 to 7% annual increases in sales tax revenue and there were lots of decisions that could be considered.. However, since 1999 the sales tax revenue has shown an average growth of 1.5% a year. Meanwhile, the bond funds have allowed a doubling of the amount of land requiring supervision and maintenance.

Salaries are the major cost of the operations and administration portions of the budget. Over these past six years salaries have been increased in accordance with overall County guidelines. At the same time additional bonds have been issued, increasing the amount of annual debt service. The area that has had to accept decreases in funding has been trail and park development. The budgeted amounts for development have decreased from a budgeted $7.5 million (including parks, trails, joint ventures, and sports facilities grants) in 2000 to $4.6 million budgeted for 2006.

Even with the decrease in development, the program has been spending about $3 million more per year than is available from new revenue. This spending has been possible because of a large surplus that would have been used for acquisitions had the bond issue not passed in 1999. This surplus is almost exhausted; so if revenues do not increase, additional cuts will need to be made in development.

In the past Open Space mainly has looked for grants to assist in acquisitions. Grants applications for maintenance and development now will have equal priority.

The 2006 budget includes: $13.15 million for debt service, $2.72 million for park development with Centennial Cone and Hildebrand Ranch parks receiving $400,000 each, $750,000 for trail development with $500,000 destined for the Bear Creek trail in Evergreen, and $2 million for joint ventures with cities and park and rec districts. The proposed amount for operations is $9.49 million, a 1.7% increase from the estimated 2005 expenditure.

The County-wide audit also has impacted Open Space. The audit determined that tenants in the Open Space building were paying too high a rate. The excess for the past four years, $2 million, has been returned to the general fund and rental income will be reduced by $600,000 per year.

Funds from the GOCO grant for South Table Mountain will be received in 2007 and 2008. These funds probably will be used to replenish the surplus.

A good thing for the budget is that the land not used by Open Space on the Center Campus was transferred to the County General Fund in 2004 with Open Space receiving $6,495,000. These funds will serve as a reserve for a few years.