The Douglas County commission meets in the historic courtroom on the second floor of the old county courthouse, 1100 Massachusetts St.

Douglas County Administrator Craig Weinaug has delivered to county commissioners a proposed 2017 budget that if approved as presented would raise the county’s mill levy by 2.085 mills.

But history suggests there will be changes, Weinaug said.

“In my years as county administrator, commissioners never have approved a budget with no changes — and never will,” he said.

The recommended budget’s total mill levy of 43.185 mills compares with the 41.098 levy in the county’s 2016 budget. A mill raises $1 of revenue for every $1,000 of assessed valuation. At 43.183 mills, the county’s share of property tax on a home appraised at $150,000 would be $745.

The proposed budget totals $84.2 million, a figure Weinaug said was misleading because it counts sales tax transfers twice and includes many nonexpenditure items like contingency funds. More relevant is the $53.8 million needed in property taxes to support proposed 2017 spending, he said.

Commissioners will start to put their stamp on the budget with work sessions starting at 8 a.m. Tuesday and 8:15 a.m. Wednesday. During those discussions, much of the focus will be on what Weinaug labels the “options” of 12 budget requests for new spending he has included in the 2017 budget and 22 additional new spending requests not figured into the budget’s calculations. All are worthy public expenditures, and it will be the task of commissioners to decide which ones are funded, he said.

Those 12 new spending requests included for funding would cost $2.67 million and require 2.197 mills in property tax support.

The largest of those new budgeted spending requests — a $1.27 million request for an ambulance service in Eudora — is not new to the commission. The city of Eudora has made the request the past three years. The request comes with $335,148 in startup costs and $937,500 in annual operating expenses.

Another new program included for funding is the $443,000 earmarked for the creation of a mental health court, which was revealed at a work session on the subject last Wednesday. That was staff’s best estimate of the cost to operate the court for a full year, although the court might not be fully functioning as of Jan. 1, 2017, Weinaug said.

It is not the only new spending request that grew from the county’s three-year review of its criminal justice system. Also budgeted is $53,000 for the creation of a crime analyst for the sheriff’s office. That position is in response for the identified need for improved jail and crime statistics.

Among the items requested but not slotted for funding is Douglas County Sheriff Ken McGovern’s $273,000 request for five additional corrections officers for the county jail. Weinaug said McGovern made a compelling case for the added officers, and that commissioners would probably give it serious consideration.

Weinaug also did not include funding for a $158,000 request from Bert Nash Community Mental Health Inc. to offset cuts in Medicaid funding from the state.

There are another $315,000 in budgeted items that stem from state mandates or from the reduction of state support for local programs. Those include $120,000 in increased funding for youth services to offset a reduction of state support of an equal amount, and $55,000 to maintain a youth services court services position. This is a transitional year for county budgeting. With a bill passed this spring in the Kansas Legislature, local jurisdictions face a cap on mill levy increases tied to the consumer price index starting with 2018 budgets. Any spending authority beyond that will require jurisdictions to get the approval of voters, although there are expenditures exempt from that provision. The 2017 budget establishes that tax lid benchmark for the county, Weinaug said.

Nonetheless, there’s no gamesmanship in the 2017 budget of sweeping revenue into reserve accounts to provide a cushion in the future, Weinaug said. On the other hand, the budget doesn’t look to such accounts for 2017 funding, he said. The use of those one-time revenue sources for funding in 2017 would set the county on course for a budget crisis, such as the state of Kansas is now facing, he said.

The tax lid legislation did play a role in his decision not to include funding for the additional jail correctional officers in 2017, Weinaug said. Public safety spending is exempt from the tax lid provision, so the additional officers could be part of a future county budget without the need of a referendum unlike those items recommended for funding, he said.

The County Commission will start its review of the budget with a work session on those requests from its 16 partnering agencies from 8 a.m. to 11:45 a.m. Tuesday. It will consider those of county agencies and offices from 8:15 a.m. to 10 a.m. Wednesday. It will meet again on the budget from 8:15 a.m. July 19 and that same time the following day if needed.