Belvidere Daily Republican—Regarding January County Board Meeting

 

Boone County approves issuing bonds for new animal building
By Bob Balgemann
Reporter

BELVIDERE - Boone County has taken another step toward construction of a new animal services building.

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The county board voted 12-0 Wednesday night (Jan. 21) to issue $800,000 in bonds for the project. At 1.33 percent interest, the total cost of the 3,000-square-foot building will be $817,000.

County Administrator Ken Terrinoni called that transaction "a good day in the financial market."

"This will ensure that the money is there for construction of the new building," said board member Karl Johnson, chairman of the finance, salaries and taxation committee. "We can proceed with the construction documents even though the location has not been selected."

The board also voted unanimously to approve spending $10,000 for architect Mark Schmidt to prepare construction documents and $4,600 for Legacy Designs for related engineering work.

Ground breaking is anticipated later in the spring, with occupancy slated for the end of 2015.

The favorite, unofficial choice for location of the new building has been county-owned land on the east side of Illinois 76, just south of Spring Creek Road, site of the highway department. But now interest is being expressed in property on South Appleton Road, where the current animal services building is located.

SOIL, WATER DISTRICT FUNDS

Board members resolved at least temporarily the issue of funding the Boone County Soil and Water Conservation District office for the 2014-15 fiscal year.

That became an issue last fall when the county board of health, which oversees the health department, refused to continue providing a $66,000 subsidy for the district's annual budget of about $133,000. That was done to help balance the department's 2014-15 budget, after the county took $50,000 from its budget to help defray expenses of the Illinois Municipal Retirement Fund.

What evolved was a lengthy verbal skirmish between the health department and county dated back to 2008-09 when the department was allowed to increase its levy by $143,000 for two consecutive years to fund an expansion. But the expansion didn't occur and the department was asked to repay the $286,000 by subsidizing the soil and water conservation district budget.

Health officials said this year they believed that debt had been satisfied, and that they no longer were obligated to help fund the district. In fact, they said the department had actually paid back $307,000.

The county board action was to transfer $33,000 from the health insurance fund to the general fund, as the county's share of the $66,000. The board of health will pay a like sum, meaning the two are splitting that cost but only for the current fiscal year.