A $1.4 million cut to the annual allocation used to improve county roads and bridges would require Douglas County Public Works to scrap some projects and reduce the scope or delay others, officials told county commissioners Monday during the first day of 2019 budget hearings.
The $1.4 million cut was among the $3.12 million proposed in the 2019 budget County Administrator Craig Weinaug presented to Douglas County Commissioners last week. The money saved from the cuts is to be reallocated to pay for solutions to jail overcrowding in light of voters’ rejection last month of Proposition 1 and the $44 million jail expansion it would have funded. The proposed budget maintains the current year’s mill levy of 46.018 mills.
Keith Browning, public works director, and Chad Voigt, deputy public works director, shared the consequences of the cut to the department’s annual capital improvement fund proposed in the 2019 budget County Administrator Craig Weinaug presented to county commissioners last week. The public works department cut, which would continue in coming years, would reduce the annual allocation to the road and bridge capital account by about half.
(Read more: LJWorld.com / Lawrence, Kansas)