While Howard County Executive Ken Ulman said he would not seek a tax increase in fiscal 2011, he said unpaid furloughs would likely be imposed again on county employees.
"Based on current projections, I assume furloughs will be repeated," Ulman told reporters Tuesday after his annual State of the County speech before more than 400 members of the county Chamber of Commerce at Turf Valley.
He said he will not ask for tax increases, but won't decide until March whether to dip into the county's $47.5 million rainy-day fund.
"We'll have to manage through our existing revenue declines," Ulman said. He told the crowd that local income tax revenue is down 7 percent, and the newest property tax assessments are down 23 percent.
Even so, county property tax revenue is expected to grow about 3 percent next fiscal year, Howard officials have said.
Most of Howard's nearly 2,000 county workers got no cost-of-living increase and lost four days' pay during unpaid furloughs between Christmas and New Year's; department heads and elected officials gave up five days' pay, saving the county a total of about $1.8 million.
Dale Chase, president of the union that represents nearly 300 blue-collar county workers, said his members are upset, especially because public safety workers are not sharing the economic pain of furloughs. County teachers were not furloughed and received a 1 percent pay raise.
"I don't think my members can take anymore," said Chase, president of local 3085 of the American Federation of State County and Municipal Employees. "My members are hurting," he said, noting that while their pay did not increase, their health care premiums did. Furloughs cause "a lot of disruption in the work force," he said.
Ulman is also pushing for a statewide waiver of the Maryland law that requires local governments to maintain school system funding at or above the current level or face a major loss of state aid. Howard County has always voluntarily boosted school funding, but forcing continued support during the recession would be counterproductive, Ulman said.
He said that maintaining the funding during fiscal 2011 would require $8 million more for schools. Combined with the growing shortfall in revenue, that would force Ulman to find all of his savings in the one-third of the budget that he controls directly.
Meanwhile, the County Council is wrestling with its own potentially embarrassing problem - whether to vote for higher pay for the next council and executive, who take office in December.
The five council members are to vote Monday night on the issue. A citizens commission recommended a $500 one-time increase for the five County Council members, plus annual increases tied to the consumer price index. The executive would get a $2,500-a-year increase plus the inflation-based raise. Council members now earn $53,400, and the county executive is paid $160,198.
Council Chairwoman Courtney Watson, an Ellicott City Democrat, and Republican Greg Fox said at a Monday night council meeting that they oppose a $500 increase for council members. Fox asked whether council pay should not be reduced, noting that members have donated their pay raises to charity in each of the past two years during the recession.
"Should we be taking our salary back to where it was two years ago?" he asked. Fox also expressed concern that the proposed pay raise for the county executive is too high.
Councilman Calvin Ball, an East Columbia Democrat, urged the council to remember that the rates set Monday night would not go into effect until December and would last four years. Neither he nor the two other members said how they will vote.
Ulman was mostly upbeat in his speech to the county's business community, pointing out that Howard faces a bright future and still has the lowest unemployment rate in Maryland.
As he often does, he praised the quality of life in Howard, which has a low crime rate, top-rated schools, libraries and parks. Construction will soon get under way on a new Ellicott City library and on the first phase of Blandair Park in Columbia, while work is well under way on the North Laurel Community Center and park and the Robinson Nature Center.
Ulman also praised Howard's low-cost health access program for the uninsured.
"The Howard County school system is a driver of our economy, and its strength is critical to our success," he said.
He did talk about the tough economy, listing a series of budget cuts he has made to meet the problem. But he placed even that in a positive context, noting increased efficiencies in joint county-school board purchasing.
He mentioned the thousands of new, high-paying federal jobs expected in the Fort Meade area under the military base realignment and closure process, or BRAC, and the expected national cybersecurity center.
"This puts Howard County at the epicenter of our nation's most important global security operation, one that will see the creation of up to 30,000 new private-sector jobs," Ulman said.
He also looked forward to the approval of rezoning for downtown Columbia, opening the door to a 30-year redevelopment expected to bring thousands of new homes, stores and offices to the Town Center.
The County Council's vote Monday, he said, "will be one of the most significant votes in Howard County history."
The speech ended on another positive point, about how the county helped solve a 30-year-old community problem on a private section of Henryton Road near Marriottsville as the result of a complaint residents brought to Ulman's annual town hall meeting last summer.
Despite a complex set of legal and financial problems that had left the road in bad shape for decades, he said, the road was paved in three months.
"The lesson here is that reasonable citizens and motivated public servants can solve any problem," Ulman said, quoting from a thank-you note he received from a resident.
"I truly believe that, and together we're doing it everyday," he said.
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