Wicomico County Council passes FY22 budget

WICOMICO COUNTY, Md. – Tuesday was decision day for Wicomico County Council, as they casted their votes on the proposed county budget for Fiscal Year 2022. Council members tell 47ABC the overall outlook for the next fiscal year is promising. “It’s an exciting future for Wicomico County,” said Council Member Josh Hastings. The Council in fact passed the budget just before 8 p.m., Tuesday evening.

The county has about $7.8 million more to work with than Fiscal Year 2021. “All the indicators show that we’re growing in the right direction. I think together with the improvements that the City of Salisbury is making, I think the county as a whole is going to be doing really well,” said Council Member John Cannon.

Council Member Cannon says some of the highlights for him include considering how emergency COVID-19 relief funding is distributed. He says he’s also keeping an eye on how rising income is impacting the county’s tax base. “Income tax receipts still went up by about 6%, which is a good sign for better times. I think right now we’re waiting to see everything falls out over the next few months,” said Council member Cannon.

For FY22, the county’s net assessable real property base went up about 3.4%. “We actually had to reduce the property tax amount because the base is up and we have the revenue cap in place,” said Council Member Cannon.

Council Member Hastings says he was also invested in keeping up with the demand for housing in the area as they drafted the budget. “It’s a good and a bad thing. We don’t want the home values to go up so high that homeowners don’t have to pay more than their taxes. But, folks want to move to Wicomico County and Salisbury, Maryland,” said Council Member Hastings.

On top of that, Council Member Hastings says he had his eye on making sure the county’s education system is getting the funds they need to get through COVID-19. “Investment in public education is important. Wicomico County is still the second lowest locally funded county out of the 24 jurisdictions in Maryland, and that’s unacceptable,” said Council Member Hastings. “To me, it was a really big priority to try to see the capital replacement of $10 million that’s going to go towards Mardela Middle and High School, as well as fully funding our request from Dr. Donna Hanlin on the education side.”

Council Member Hastings adds that the county is making a record investment in the Sheriff’s Office, with about $1.1 million going to a new contract. “That is specifically to retain and attract the best law enforcement officers here to Wicomico County. $57,000 has been put in the budget for body cameras, so we can have some more transparency in the work that we’re doing,” said Council Member Hastings.

Council Member Cannon says he expects the budget to pass. But of course, he adds there’s always room for improvement. “I think that we do need to make sure that we reevaluate our Civic Center, tourism, recreation, and parks. Those are areas that really did suffer from COVID,” said Council Member Cannon.

For Council Member Hastings, he agrees that the impact of COVID-19 will be far reaching. So, he says keeping that in mind in the coming years will be essential. “We’re going to need some help to think through how COVID is going to impact us, not just in this budget year, but in the coming budget years, and what that’s going to look like,” said Council Member Hastings.