The Cass County Board of Supervisors today (Wednesday), adopted the Fiscal Year 2019 County Budget, Secondary Roads Budget, and acted upon a recommendation from the County Compensation Board, for elected officers’ salaries. The adopted budget calls for a decrease in the levy of around 15.5-cents per thousand dollars assessed property valuation. Auditor Dale Sunderman said a majority of the decrease was attributable to the County MH/DS (Mental Health) Fund, which went from$305, 371 in the current FY, to $276,297 in FY 2018-19. The reason, he said, is to reduce the cash balance for the reserve that’s fairly large, trying to bring that down to a lower level.

The Capital Projects budget is fairly large, Sunderman said, because of the ethanol plant. The budget for that line item is over $3.4-million. The FY 2018-19 budget calls for $3.95-million.

As far as the County Compensation Board’s recommendations for elected officers, the Board of Supervisors cut 25-percent from the recommendation across the Board, to increase the salaries one-percent over last year. The annual salaries include:

• County Attorney $100,000 (New, full-time position)
• County Auditor, Recorder and Treasurer $59,339 each (last year $57,354)
• County Sheriff $77,831 (Last year $74,324)
• Supervisors $29,808 (Last year $29,232)
• Supervisor Chair $30,808. (Last year $30,232)