A mid-year budget review for the county of Plumas highlighted the positives amid years of turmoil that has raised many eyebrows in recent months as departments struggle to find the ability to retain staff in their budgets.
Beginning in 2019, with implementing a new financial module, County administrator Debrora Lucero says the county withstood many blows yet continued to move forward, facing challenges like wildfire, a countywide data breach, and COVID.
The county will begin to take steps towards correcting current issues, including a reinstall of the financial module if necessary as well as instituting financial training for staff, assessing energy usage to cut costs, and consolidating purchasing. Lucero also suggested allocating PG&E settlement funds to be received in the amount of nearly 8 million dollars to offset OT costs due to staffing shortages. Lucero says one of the county’s top priorities in the year will be to increase wages.
Lucero reported department budgets are stable for the year and county revenue remains on track.
