FARMINGTON — The Franklin County Budget Advisory Committee announced Tuesday it will hold an initial vote April 25 on the proposed $9.26 million budget for government and jail operations for 2023-24.

The committee will meet at 4 p.m. upstairs in the courtroom at the county courthouse.

A public hearing on the budget will be held at 4 p.m. May 9 in the courtroom.

A date for the committee’s final vote has not been set.

The panel met with department heads Tuesday to review the $6.53 million county government budget. It also reviewed the proposed $2.73 million jail budget with jail administrators. The amounts do not factor in revenues.

Overall, the combined budgets are $1.55 million more than what was approved for 2022-23. The overall increase in spending is about 20%, county Administrator Amy Bernard said.

The government spending also includes $195,950 for other countywide expenses. Of that amount, $50,008 is for interest and principal for debt service on the county Regional Communications Center. Franklin County voters approved a $598,300 bond for a new dispatch center in June 2012 by a vote of 2,062 to 2,035.

The other $145,942 is for 10 nonprofits.  The initial request from the agencies was $295,039 but commissioners reduced it to $145,942.

A large factor in the increase is attributed to outsourcing the finance operations for the county, more staff for the jail and Sheriff’s Office, information technologies and courthouse.

“Costs for the county are increasing,” Bernard wrote in a summary of the budget. “Salary increases for existing employees that were deferred for multiple years were given in late June 2022, which was not incorporated in last year’s budget. Instead, they were paid out of (the county’s) undesignated funds.”

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