Carbon County is loaning its Children and Youth Services department $400,000 to help with operational costs until state reimbursements come in.

On Thursday, the county approved the loan.

Commissioner Wayne Nothstein said that the money will come from the county’s capital funds budget and added that the county may also need to borrow upward of $5 to $7 million in loans for county operating purposes until state funds and county taxes begin to come in.

“We need to make payroll, any other payments, electricity, utilities, all that,” he said. “Those are expenses between now and April until the tax revenues come in.

Last year, the county operated as its own bank, loaning $4 million from the capital funds budget to its general fund to help cover $3.4 million that the county was waiting to come in from the state for reimbursements to Children and Youth.

Nothstein said that the county will again pay the loan back with interest like last year.

When asked if the county has received all of the money it was owed from the state for Children and Youth reimbursements, the commissioners said that the county had received over $3 million, but they weren’t sure if reimbursements are up-to-date at this time or if a backlog was again building.

The board cited the state budget as a factor in whether reimbursements were made to counties in a timely manner.