MINOT, N.D. (KXNET) — Some agencies won’t be getting the funding they asked for because the Ward County Commission had to cut some of the projects from the 2024 budget.

During a meeting on Tuesday, commissioners talked about the many requests made at the public hearing last week.

Project Bee, Visit Minot, Assiniboine River Basin, and the State Fair won’t be receiving local money this next year.

The State Fair was even cut an additional $100,000 and with these cuts, it frees up $202,350 in the budget.

“I agree if we have not been able to hire eight, it does not look good for 10. It may be something we get filled in the middle of the year. But then we have those open positions for six months. We may able to fund them just not out of the salary schedule. Just out of the salary we are not using in the six months,” said Paul Olthoff, Major Chief Deputy.

According to Marisa Haman, next year’s budget is around $57.3 million so far, last year’s budget was a little under $57 million.

The commission is .70 mills over last year and department heads want to keep the levy the same as 2023 which means about a $1.7 million increase in total dollars levied.

The deadline is October 10 and they are hoping to approve the budget at the regular meeting on October 3.

“Right now, most of the mill levy that comes in for road projects is primarily for maintaining our system that we have and we are falling behind just due to the increased costs. We have had to shift a number of jobs down the road due to inflation,” said Dana Larsen, a highway engineer.

Larsen says that sales taxes could help reinstate a few of the projects and commissioners are looking at a two to five year for additional projects.

Many of those projects are in their transportation plan such as adding paved roads in places.

According to Haman, Highway and Road are receiving money from sales tax and bonds they are paying off.

“It varies with each board. We take in requests from all those agencies. A lot of times we are already cutting those requests. Usually, they try to do it in a fair way. If you are looking at historical societies there is only a certain amount we are able to levy for historical certain societies. Typically the requests come in higher than that. So the percentage-wise, they will reduce that typically unless there is a smaller one that doesn’t ask for that much they will get 100% which is like $2,000,” said Marisa Haman, the auditor treasurer for Ward County.

Every year the board looks at different ways to allocate money and cut requests in a fair manner.

They are trying to cut where they can after hearing the public’s concerns.