County board looks at the future of LOST revenue

A proposal to begin exploring whether Adair County voters should be asked to broaden the use of local option sales tax revenue died for lack of a second last Wednesday after supervisors debated whether the money should remain dedicated to secondary roads.

Supervisor Jodie Hoadley raised the issue, saying counties are being asked to cover more costs while having fewer ways to raise the money needed to pay for them.

Local option sales tax, commonly referred to as LOST, currently brings Adair County about $850,000 annually, according to County Engineer Nick Kauffman. In Adair County, that money is earmarked for secondary roads projects in areas that do not benefit from tax increment financing revenue generated by projects such as wind turbines.

Hoadley said the county may need more flexibility in how it uses those dollars, especially as state-mandated costs continue to grow and recent property tax legislation limits how much certain county property tax revenue can increase each year.

Voters first approved lost in LOST, with a sunset of June 30, 2012. An election was held in May 2011 to pass it without a new sunset, and it passed, stating that revenue from LOST should be “0% for property tax relief and 100% for bridge maintenance and repair,” Adair County Auditor Mandy Berg told the newspaper.

A main concern, Hoadley said, is the 2% allowable growth cap included in recent property tax reform approved by the Iowa Legislature. She said counties are facing more unfunded mandates — services or requirements the state expects counties to pay for without providing sufficient funding — while also seeing tighter limits on local revenue growth.

One option, Hoadley said, would be for supervisors to begin exploring placing a question on the November ballot asking voters whether the county should be allowed to use LOST revenue for purposes beyond secondary roads.

“That’s their money that they’re paying into,” Hoadley said of voters.

The discussion exposed a central tension for supervisors: whether the county should seek more flexibility to pay for rising general county costs, or whether LOST revenue should remain dedicated to road and bridge needs that officials said are still significant.

Chairman Jerry Walker said there are still 44 bridges in the county that need to be fixed and brought up to standard. Kauffman said some bridges outside urban renewal areas also do not qualify for federal funding because they do not meet minimum traffic count thresholds. That makes access to LOST revenue especially important for secondary roads, he said.

“There’s no finish line” for fixing bridges, Kauffman said.

Kauffman said Adair County is in “so much better shape” than it was 20 years ago when it comes to roads and bridges, in part because LOST revenue has been available for those projects.

He also said he is concerned that if the money is opened up for other uses, secondary roads could eventually lose funding it has counted on. Kauffman said that in the past, supervisors began sharing money for other purposes and money once promised for secondary roads did not return.

Hoadley made a motion to begin exploring the process for placing a question on the November ballot that would ask voters whether the county should be allowed to use LOST revenue for purposes beyond secondary roads. The motion died for lack of a second.

Supervisor Matt Wedemeyer said there is no reason to believe the county’s funding climate could not change in the next few years. Supervisor Nathan Baier also favored waiting a year or two before moving forward, saying the legislative changes are new to everyone.

No action was taken.

The supervisors also held discussion on the status of the county’s public health department, which is currently without a director. An idea has been proposed to consolidate services with Guthrie County; however, the supervisors felt they needed more information on that idea before taking action.