FLORENCE — The Pinal County Board of Supervisors has adopted the 2016/2017 fiscal year tentative budget for $410,193,288. It is a structurally balanced budget for the county.
This tentative budget is $11 million less than the 2015/2016 budget. The property tax will remain the same at $3.99 per one hundred dollars of assessed valuation.
Assistant County Manager Leo Lew made the presentation before the board and his message was that of cautious optimism for the upcoming year.
“Related to the property valuations, our new construction is still relatively modest, but there has been some growth over last year at $37.7 million.” Lew said. “This year we are looking at $50.9 million. So we are headed in the right direction and slowly increasing from the bottom which looks to be the norm for us.”
He also pointed out that general fund sales tax revenues have been growing healthy over the past two years and are continuing to grow.
Looking at the general fund distribution, 60 percent will go to the public safety and law sector that includes the Sheriff’s Office, Courts and the County Attorney’s Office. General government expenditures comes out to 24 percent in the distribution of the general fund and 16 percent to public health and a category other.
On every dollar of property tax that is collected by Pinal County, only 25 cents goes to the county, while the rest goes to school districts, Central Arizona College, cities and towns along with other taxing entities.
By law, the tentative budget can decrease and monies can be transferred, but the total cannot increase.