The Cumberland County Commission is tentatively scheduled to adopt its 2018-2019 budget at a special called meeting Thursday, August 9^th. The session will begin with a public hearing at 6:30, followed by the full commission’s vote on the budget at 7. Cumberland County Finance Director Nathan Brock told 1057 News the process at the county level differs from the City Council’s budget-adoption process. “We present the final proposed budget to the County Commission and that’s what they vote on. From that, [the commission] sets the tax rate and that kind of thing,” Brock explained. He went on to say the proposed budget does not include an increase in the property tax. “The County Commission can always, as a group, do anything they want with the tax rate,” he said, adding, “but that’s pretty rare to see.”

And although the election of new county commissioners will have taken place the previous week, newly elected commissioners will not be sworn into office until September 1, so the existing commission members, who hammered out the budget, are the ones who will actually vote on it.

“We think we’ve got it all where it needs to be, but until it’s done and it’s printed, we don’t like to brag that we’ve got a budget,” Brock cautioned.