GOLD BEACH – The Curry County Board of Commissioners will hold a special meeting this afternoon when the Curry County Citizens’ Committee will present its final recommendations to the Board. The committee’s mission was to examine the County’s financial status and contribute to the development of potential options for addressing the County’s budgetary shortfalls. 

The 1 p.m. meeting will be held at the Curry County Fairgrounds’ Docia Sweet Hall.

“When they present that list to us, we’re going to have to dig in to see what makes the most sense,” Commissioner Bill Waddle said. “We’ll have to look at everything from a legal point of view.”

Waddle said the commissioners will have to look at those recommendations and check them with Oregon statutes.

“I’m looking forward to see what suggestions can be legally done,” Waddle said.

Oregon Consensus at Portland State University helped to organize the Citizens’ Committee, with Michael Mills moderating their meetings which began On Nov. 30. The committee was divided into three subcommittees with each polishing their recommendations, then bringing them to the full committee on Jan. 13.

The Citizens’ Committee is meeting at the same location starting at 9 a.m., preparing for the afternoon meeting with the commissioners.

The 23-member committee considered about two dozen recommendations at their mid-January meeting, and ranked them by votes.

Those proposals ranged from raising property taxes, to imposing a countywide sales tax, merging Brookings’ and the county’s 911 systems, and a city-county combination of law enforcement. 

A five-member subgroup of that committee has been polishing the recommendation over the past couple of weeks and was to bring their work to the full committee this morning before presenting the list to county commissioners this afternoon.

Both the morning meeting of the committee and the afternoon commissioners’ meeting are open to the public.

The commissioners, not waiting for the committee, were to begin working on some projects at their regular meeting at 10 a.m. today at their hearing room at the County Annex building.

They were to consider a resolution to transfer the County Animal Shelter to a nonprofit group and a resolution authorizing the county to proceed with the transition of Health and Human Services from the county to one or more separate entities.

“Pennies for Pooches want to take over the animal shelter. We’re working with them,” Waddle said.

In making recommendations for several possible taxes to help the county out of its crisis, committee members overwhelmingly recommended at the mid-January meeting that any tax vote not be taken in the May primary election but delayed until the November General Election.

Most felt May would be too soon to get information out to the voters.

Waddle said that could cause problems, especially with a property tax levy, because any increase could not be collected until November 2013.

He said an increase approved in May, or even one in a special election as late as September, could be included in the taxes billed for November.

But he noted a special September election would be expensive and any measure would require a double-double to pass – more than a 50 percent voter turnout and more than a 50 percent favorable vote.

Brookings City Manager Gary Milliman headed the group charged with revenue recommendations.

“We received over 30 suggestions. We have come up with nine we are pushing here,” he said.

Those recommendations included a county transit lodging tax, a law enforcement property tax and a sales tax.

The countywide sales tax proposal would exclude food and pharmacy.

“One cent countywide would raise $2.25 million,” Milliman said. “That could solve our problem.”