By Chris OrletRecord Managing EditorThe Warren County Commission last week adopted the 2014 budget that includes a 1 percent raise for employees.The commissioners voted 3-0 to adopt the $13.6 million budget at the end of a public meeting last Thursday. This is a decrease of $210,397 from last year’s budget.Officials said the decrease is due to the willingness of county departments to reduce their spending in order to balance all of the county funds.Commissioners promised in November to consider cost-of-living allowances for employees during the budgeting process, if funds were available.According to County Clerk Barb Daly, most employees received a 25-cent hourly raise in 2012; a 10-cent pay hike in 2011; a 50-cent raise in 2008; a 40-cent raise in 2007; and a 50-cent raise in 2006.Last November, the Warren County Salary Commission voted against raises for five elected officials.In addition to the raises, the commission will fund 100 percent of health care premiums for county employees. Presiding Commissioner Arden Engelage said the county was able to negotiate a 9.9 percent increase instead of a proposed 20 percent increase.Additionally, up to $500 will be paid into health care savings accounts for participating employees. Those funds typically are used to cover co-pays and deductibles.The $500 contribution to employees’ health care savings accounts stops once an employee reaches the $1,500 limit. Once any part of that money is expended, the county resumes making HSA contributions.“I feel really good about this year’s budget,” said Engelage, citing the raise for employees and the lower-than-expected health care rate increase.“We’ve been tightening our budget for years, but we’ve got to the point where we can’t tighten it any more,” Engelage said.The county’s main revenue source remains sales taxes and taxes on real estate and personal property.The county’s three half-cent sales taxes are projected to be down about $20,000 from last year. The sales tax and use tax revenue to the general revenue fund, law enforcement fund, and capital improvement funds are projected at $1,311,000 per fund.Engelage said lower revenues are due to the county losing business and businesses, especially to the Internet.Hubie Kluesner, Southern District commissioner, said Internet shopping is the trend. “We have no tools to collect Internet taxes,” he said. “We need the Legislature to impose the same sales tax on Internet sales as it does on brick-and-mortar stores.”Engelage said the new use tax, in effect since last summer, was filling in the gap.“We’re not keeping pace,” said Dan Hampson, Northern District commissioner. “The use tax filling in the gaps won’t work for long.”The 2014 budget for the various county funds is as follows:• General fund —$4,392,852 in revenue and $4,277,658 in expenditures;• Law enforcement — $3,204,848 in revenue and $3,201,376 in expenditures;• Capital improvements — $518,364 in revenue and $478,811 in expenditures;• Special road and bridge fund — $4,033,149 in revenue and $3,652,809 in expenditures;• Road and bridge capital fund — $673,177 in revenue and $660,000 in expenditures;• Assessment — $820,724 in revenue and $559,460 in expenditures;• Federal grants — $42,013 in revenue and $42,013 in expenditures.Other budget notesThis year the Warren County Circuit Court plans to install video conferencing in its courtrooms in order to increase security by not having to move prisoners to and from detention facilities. This also should reduce prisoner transport costs, officials said.The county commission budgeted $86,793 for four law enforcement vehicles.A portion of the $475,811 capital improvements trust fund was budgeted to remodel the prosecuting attorney’s office in the courthouse and for the replacement of the courthouse security scanner, a grinder pump for the jail sewer system and ice guards for the recycling center.The road and bridge fund includes funds to purchase a 1-ton pickup truck with a spreader box and a grader and backhoe, as well as money for engineering for a new bridge project.In addition to regular county road maintenance, money has been set aside to overlay six miles of county roads. The road department also plans to work with MoDOT to install asphalt aprons where state highways meet county gravel roads.County budget includes raise for employees