Carbon County officials aired their frustrations with the state lagging in reimbursements, which in turn forces the county in more of a deficit at the beginning of the year.

“We pay out to Children and Youth. We pay out aging and the state is negligent in giving us our money in time,” Commissioner Rocky Ahner said Thursday. “So we’re building a fund balance up to help them. I think it’s time that they start giving us our money on time so we can operate efficiently. Why should we be three months behind?”

At one time, Ahner said, the state owed the county approximately $4 million for Children and Youth and last month the county had to loan Area Agency on Aging $100,000.

“Evidently at the state level, they don’t care about Children and Youth or aging if they don’t want to give us our money at the appropriate time.”

Commissioner Wayne Nothstein agreed regarding this thought, but said that unless counties can convince state legislators to make changes, it falls on the backs of counties to cover the costs.

“They are not reimbursing the county in a timely fashion,” Nothstein said. “Another thing that gripes me, these people in Harrisburg, when they run they are ‘I did not raise taxes, I did not raise taxes,’ but who pays for it, the funding, the services, the counties do and I have had enough of the state. The state takes care of itself first.”

Nothstein used the example of the district magistrate offices. Carbon County has four magistrates, which cost approximately $1.1 million.

“The only thing the state pays for is for the magistrates. The county pays the balance,” he said.

When there is a $150 fine, “since 1977, the county gets $12.50 for those tickets. The police departments get $12.50 for that ticket ... who took care of themselves? We have to get on our elected officials’ cases and I plan on doing that,” Nothstein said. “Enough is enough. I’m tired of the unfunded mandates we have to pay for and they’re not doing their job.”

“Every time they pass a bill, it costs us money,” he added, using the 911 fee where one state representative voted no against the 911 fee to help offset costs. “I told him, you just voted for me to raise taxes because somebody has to pay those bills, somebody has to pay for the equipment, somebody has to pay the dispatchers, somebody has to pay the maintenance for the rental for the cell towers, so I have to raise taxes. To make you look good, we take the heat all the time.”

Commissioners’ Chairman Mike Sofranko agreed with his colleagues on various aspects of their thoughts.

For example, the state owes the county approximately $662,000 in reimbursements for services in Area Agency on Aging.

He noted that it is not the Office of Aging but the state.

However, rebuilding the fund balance is necessary for the future.

“We keep borrowing from savings. It’s gone. We don’t have that anymore. Because of that S&P lowered our rate, which means when we go borrow money now, we pay a higher interest rate. That is poor management. That doesn’t mean we have grow the fund balance to what it was, but we need to be able to pay our bills. We’re not trying to grow this balance, we’re just trying to get these ratings to where we need to be.”