TRINITY COUNTY, Calif. — Trinity County is getting into budget talks on Sept. 24 and their supervisor meeting the week before on Tuesday had a main focus for many, the multi-million dollar deficit the county is facing that’s left multiple services at risk.
With both the county’s libraries and their animal shelter on the chopping block, residents and officials were coming out with solutions they said could find that funding needed.
“We believe in education and we believe in our children,” says one resident who identified herself as a former teacher. “We believe in our animals, and I really really hope that there is some way we can continue to have a library.“
“There will be dogs in the shelter. The lights will still have to be on,” said Ben Kellogg with Friends of the Trinity Animal Shelter. “Water will still have to be flowed, so my question has always been how much are we actually saving.
While not filling the room the majority of residents there were passionate about keeping the two at-risk services. Officials shared they’d been working to find other options.
They looked at funding options from an increase on hotel taxes or sales taxes to creating County Service Areas for the programs. This would see residents pay into a fund specifically for these services, which is a system already in place for the county’s hospital. Another option discussed was having non-profits step in, which the friends of the Trinity Library are looking to do.
“Friends believe that the library could remain open from Oct. 1, 2024, through June 30, 2025, at a reduced level if the friends of the library provide the county with approximately $35,000,” says one woman who said she represented The Friends of the Library. “We are working to acquire sufficient grant and donation funding to meet this goal.“
However, these options will take time to implement and officials say non-profits stepping in would only provide a temporary solution. With departments being hit across the board everywhere is facing hits.
That’s especially true for the Trinity County Sheriff’s Office. Sheriff Tim Saxon confirmed over the phone that he’s had to pull almost all deputies from patrols and have them work in needed positions at the jail as they struggle to fill roles. Saxon says he does not want to see the libraries or animal shelters close. However, he feels his department is between a rock and a hard place with no extra funding.
Supervisor Jill Cox says getting out of the hole will take the whole county coming together to make tough choices.
“What do we need those outcomes to be, you know, five years down the road, ten years down the road,” Cox says. “We’ve got to have that mindset and then of course do what we can do today to have those things that we wish that we could have and provide.“
The county’s budget hearings for actually determining the budget start Sept. 24 and they invite all residents to come and get engaged so everyone can help figure out how to keep as much running as possible.
