$3.2B county budget includes spending hikes
Increase of 6.4% features employee raises, bumps to flood control and public health
Harris County Commissioners Court approved a $3.2 billion general fund budget Tuesday, which includes a 2 percent raise for employees and modest spending boosts for the sheriff, public health and pollution control departments.
The $198 million in new spending, which court members approved unanimously, represents a 6.4 percent increase over the current budget.
Court members also set a Harris County Flood Control District budget of $718.5 million, a 14 percent increase over the current year. More than half of that total will come from the $2.5 billion flood infrastructure bond voters approved in 2017.
County Judge Lina Hidalgo called the budget imperfect but more reflective of the needs of the county than when she took office a year ago.
“It was a much more thorough process than it has been historically, in terms of what was presented to us,” Hidalgo said. “The big step that’s missing is true evidence-based budgeting.”
Hidalgo, who wants the budgeting process to be more focused on performance-based metrics, had urged department heads to make ambitious funding proposals. They took that advice to heart and pitched a total of $114 million in increases, far above the additional $50 million the budget office estimated was available.
Harris County Public Health
Executive Director Dr. Umair Shah had asked to nearly double his budget, while Sheriff Ed Gonzalez asked for $20 million more, largely for new patrol positions.
Court members made a few tweaks at the dais Tuesday to give departments higher appropriations than the 2 percent acrossthe-board salary bump.
On the recommendation of Precinct 2 Commissioner Adrian Garcia, court members gave the health department an additional $5.7 million to fund 46 new veterinary positions, 31 positions in nutrition and chronic disease prevention, and 62 positions in disease control and clinical prevention programs.
‘Reality of things’
The Sheriff ’s Office patrol and administration budget got an $11.4 million increase, though Gonzalez said that largely will fund raises for existing deputies.
The court agreed to free up an additional $2.5 million for the sheriff by moving some fleet maintenance costs to a different section of the budget at the recommendation of Precinct 4 Commissioner Jack Cagle.
Gonzalez said the extra funds could fund a new academy class of about 50 deputies or give an additional 1 percent raise to existing officers.
He noted it is far short of the 260 deputy positions he had asked for, which he wanted to deploy in the fast-growing unincorporated Harris County.
“I’d like to have it, but I’m not going to be able to grow operations as we had hoped,” Gonzalez said. “That’s just the reality of things.”
District Attorney Kim Ogg had asked for $12.5 million for 58 new prosecutors, but for the second straight year, she struck out with Commissioners Court. Last February, court members rejected her pitch for 102 new prosecutors.
Ogg has, however, had success getting piecemeal budget requests approved, including four new prosecutors to prosecute financial crimes.
The court on Tuesday granted her office an additional $5.7 million, not enough to fund the new prosecutors she had sought.
“We appreciate the unanimous support of the commissioners as we continue to work each day to get the right end result for crime victims, the accused and the entire community,” Harris County District Attorney Kim Ogg said following the vote.
Hidalgo said she is sensitive to under-funded law enforcement needs, though she wants to wait for the results of a study of the county’s justice system before making long-term spending commitments. Much of the downtown criminal justice complex remains in disrepair from damage wrought by Hurricane Harvey in 2017. The county also has yet to determine how much the implementation of its landmark misdemeanor bail reform settlement will cost, with estimates ranging from $59 million to $97 million over seven years.
‘No to more things’
Hidalgo said budgeting will be more difficult next year under a new revenue cap set by the Legislature,
which limits year-overyear revenue growth to 3.5 percent. A workaround plan by Hidalgo and her two Democratic colleagues to raise property taxes before the cap goes into effect was thwarted by the two Republican court members.
“Every year it gets progressively worse, because our county grows and grows, and our revenue doesn’t at a commensurate rate,” Hidalgo said. “As the years go by, we’re going to have to say no to a lot more things.”