2 days in to the new budget year and the county already has unexpected expenses

The new budget year is just a few days old and already the county is being asked to find money for new purchases.

On Tuesday the tax collector and the property appraiser asked the county commission to spend nearly 46 thousand dollars for a new AS/400.

That’s a server that the two offices share that helps make sure the tax system works smoothly.

Tax collector James Harris said the current machine is 8 years old and is no longer properly reading the tapes it uses.

The new system will also allow for the tax and property data to be stored off-site, which will be a big help if a disaster knocks everything off-line.

Mister Harris said that with the off-site backup it would be possible to bring the system back on-line within hours instead of days or weeks.

County commissioners’ number one question was where the money will come from.

After some tense discussion with the property appraiser over salaries at the property appraiser’s office, the board decided to take the money from capitol outlay.

Commissioner Cheryl Sanders did ask that if either office found money in their budget this year that it be returned to the county to offset the purchase. 

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