10 workers laid off from road department
Ten Jefferson County road department employees have been laid off for the rest of 2024 in order to improve the county’s cash flow, County Judge Gerald Robinson announced.
Robinson made the decision after a meeting late last week with Road Superintendent Rickey Bullard. The layoffs leave the department with 26 employees, 22 of whom are working on the roads, Robinson said.
The problem, according to Robinson, stems from the mounting delinquent bills the county has had to face since last year, which he blamed on a lack of rules of procedure for conducting business, which the Quorum Court normally approves at the start of each year.
“We had been discussing the needs of the road department,” Robinson said. “We had the appropriations, but we did not have cash on hand. We met to have a discussion with the treasurer. Our treasurer informed us that the money that was available for us was in the reserves, one being the cash-only reserves and the other being the emergency reserves. The amount of cash that we need would somehow almost deplete one of the reserves.”
According to Sandra Graves, an office manager for the Road, Recycling, E-Waste, Sanitation and Environmental departments, the County Judge’s office spent $1,086,208 on “predominantly past due bills” during January and $900,000 on the same in February for a total of nearly $2 million. The average turnback money, or county and municipal aid funds from the Arkansas Treasury, for Jefferson County is $200,000 per month.
“In 2024, the Quorum Court gave us $1 million, but we still needed $800,000 to pay other delinquent bills to have $1 million in reserves,” Robinson said. “We did not get those official appropriations, so what happened is that the 2024 budget was used to pay delinquent bills for 2023. That started us out with a defi
ciency in cash because we had to spend cash on hand to pay those delinquent bills.”
District 5 Justice of the Peace Lloyd Franklin Jr., who has been known to oppose Robinson on many Quorum Court-related issues, characterized the judge’s appropriations claim as “a bald-faced lie,” accusing him of many lies.
“The county judge has exceeded his budget in 2023, which is a crime to bring indebtedness into the county,” Franklin said. “You stay within your budget. If you need an appropriation, you come to us, but that doesn’t mean we’ll give it to you.”
Franklin showed a chart of budget comparisons that revealed how the County Judge’s budget has grown from $506,353.50 in 2015 to $1,573,033.91 this year. The original budget in 2023, according to the chart, called for $1,513,919.98, but after transfers and appropriations, it grew to $1,981,263.28. So far, by Graves’ total, the County Judge’s office spent $1,986,208 in 2024.
“Out of the past five judges, none of them had gotten money from county general [fund],” Franklin said. “Road department funding from the state is allocated.”
Robinson explained Jefferson County dropped down from Class 6 to Class 5 in census figures as of 2020 with 67,260 people. Class 6 counties have at least 70,000 people but fewer than 200,000.
The county’s turnback money isn’t as much as when it was in Class 6, Robinson said, resulting in a loss of about $50,000 per month.
“It didn’t help us that our materials are increasing in terms of price, such as our asphalt, our fuel, our rocks and our culverts,” he said. “We had no other choice but to deal with the fact that our turnback is just enough to pay payroll. So, I made the decision to do a temporary layoff until the first of the year of 10 people. That was a decision made, knowing nothing else can be done, so we can continue to make it.”
The affected employees were notified of their layoffs via letter from Bullard last Thursday, according to a copy Franklin provided. A shortfall of revenue due to the inflation of costs on materials was blamed for the layoffs in the letter.
“As revenue increases and provides us with a more stable budget, you will be eligible for a call back,” the letter reads. A message seeking comment was left for Bullard.
Robinson said he would ask the Quorum Court for about $700,000 in appropriations, but the request was going to be too late for the agenda for Tuesday’s regular meeting.
Before the meeting, Franklin accused Robinson of exceeding his revenue by spending it faster than it comes in.
“He created a million dollars more in extra bills,” Franklin said. “We owe these vendors. There are bills he created that weren’t approved, say like [a construction company]. If we didn’t tell you to create that bill and you didn’t have the money, you don’t go get the work done. He’s going out creating these bills and forcing the Quorum Court to approve it.”