I attended the September 17, 2024, Camden County Commission meeting at 10:00 a.m.
Commissioners Gohagan and Skelton were present.
The first agenda item was “Review/approve annual financial audit report by Daniel Jones & Associates for Camden County.”
This was the annual external audit of Camden County for 2023 that is required by various regulatory and bonding agencies. I believe Camden County also uses these external audits to cover for the fact that the Camden County Auditor doesn’t annually audit all of the county officers in accordance with state statute.
“The auditor shall audit the accounts of all officers of the county annually or upon their retirement from office.”
Presiding Commissioner Skelton commented that the external audit did not identify any serious problems.
Commissioner Gohagan asked the County Auditor if the current budget would allow for a cost of living adjustment for county employees?
Auditor Laughlin was hesitant to confirm that and wanted to see how the 2025 budget looked once more of the 2024 revenue data was in. According to Laughlin, the growth in the county’s sales tax revenue had bottomed out since COVID and was now slowly trending upward. The increase was much flatter than the steep rise in 2021.
Laughlin also mentioned that he had met with Sheriff-Elect Edgar regarding the budget for his department. Edgar was interested in establishing a formal pay scale for the deputies and that cost was being calculated.
The commissioners unanimously approved the 2023 audit report.
The second agenda item was “Tax Levy review/approve.”
The commissioners were presented with County Clerk Rowland Todd’s computation of reassessment growth to determine if the road and bridge property tax levy could or should be changed.
The 2024 Camden County real estate assessment increased from $1,489,096,929 to $1,521,429,843.
The 2024 county’s Personal Property assessment increased from $432,087,718 to $467,965,592.
The current road and bridge property tax levy rate is 0.110. The maximum authorized levy rate is 0.3500.
Presiding Commissioner Skelton wondered if it might be appropriate to increase the property tax levy to generate more tax revenue the Road and Bridge Department? County Clerk Todd pointed out that any increase would still have to be approved by the State Auditor. Todd also pointed out that the Commission needed to decide on the levy rate by September 20th.
Commissioner Gohagan stated that he wanted to have a better idea of how balanced the county’s budget was going to be before they started adjusting the County and Road and Bridge levy rates. He expressed a distaste for governments that raise taxes and then produce a budget surplus.
The County Treasurer confirmed that Camden County had a reserve of $5.9 million invested in a CD.
After some more discussion, the Commission eventually voted unanimously to keep the levy rate where it was.
During Public Comment, Tom Abbett from the Ozark Amphitheater spoke to the commissioners. Abbett said that the venue had 7,500 person audience at a concert and generated $1 million the previous weekend.
According to Abbett, the concert traffic had been managed well and none of it had backed up onto Highway 5. They were able to move the traffic along Pier 31 Court. Abbett hoped that there could be some future collaboration between the Amphitheater and the various involved government organizations to expand a half mile stretch of Pier 31 Court into a 3 lane road. This would allow incoming and outgoing traffic to use two lanes to enter and exit the Ozark Amphitheater parking lots.
The Commission advised him to discuss the matter with the Camden County Road and Bridge Administrator.
And that was that.
Among the Dogwoods 