The Ohio Department of
Natural Resources and its subject divisions and offices are not immune from the
required cuts insisted by Ohio Governor Mike DeWine.
These $775 million worth
of cuts are directly related to the severe tax revenue shortages that were the
collateral damage caused by the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. About one
million Ohioans are out of work and thus not paying any state income tax while
such things as sales tax receipts have also plummeted.
To illustrate, at the
end of February, state revenue for Fiscal Year 2020 were ahead of estimates by
more than $200 million. Just two months later at the end of April and following
DeWine’s Stay Home orders, Ohio’s tax revenues were down $777 million.
Thus, the need to do
more than just pinch a few pennies was required. A cleaving of very nearly
every segment of state government is being compelled to sacrifice a portion of
their remaining Fiscal Year 2020 budget, which ends June 30th.
And DeWine has decided to
hold off until the start of Fiscal Year 2021 before dipping into the state’s so-called
“rainy day fund,” a savings account of sort.
The Department’s Assembly-approved
Fiscal Year 2021 budget of $414.4 million is all but guaranteed to experience a
significant downturn, as well.
The Ohio Department of Natural Resources is no different from
experiencing cuts, either.
Under DeWine’s $775 million reduction order, “…out of the GRF (taxpayer dollars), we have to spend
$2.1 million less than planned,” said Sarah Wickham, chief of the Natural
Resources Department’s office of communications.
“Out of the non-GRF (all revenue other
than general tax dollars, such as fees), we have to spend $22 million less than
originally planned,” Wickham said in her prepared statement.
However, in a May 6th
audio press conference with reporters, the director of the Ohio Office of
Budget and Management Kimberly Murnieks said it is up to the various impacted
departments and such to determine what should be cut and where.
“These are not raiding
raids,” Murnieks told the reporters. “And we’re not supplying cuts for them.”
Some Natural Resources
Department divisions and offices are better able to weather the cuts, too. This
is because they rely almost entirely on non-General Revenue Fund money for
their existence.
The Watercraft section
of the Ohio Division of Parks and Watercraft, for instance, is funded in large
part by boat registration and titling fees, a portion of the state motor fuel
tax and some federal grant money.
The best off is the Ohio
Division of Wildlife. This agency receives funding chiefly through the sale of
hunting and fishing licenses and related tags along with a portion of the
federal excise tax on firearms, ammunition, fishing tackle, and archery tackle.
The Wildlife Division’s
funding mix is a bit more complicated, though, because of the adoption of
multiyear licenses with year-to-year carryover and overlaps making apples to
apples comparisons more challenging, agency officials say.
Even so, the Wildlife
Divisions to-date license sales income is up in spite of a cool spring and
COVID-19, either of which could have dulled revenue sources, but neither of
which combined appears to have done so.
Figures supplied by the Wildlife Division’s
communications and education group show the agency has received to-date $8.44
million in all license compared to the same to-date period in 2019 of $8.38
million, or an increase of around one percent.
This jump in fishing license sales appears to mirror something
of a national interest in fishing trend. A reported on Harris poll recently
found that 24 percent of respondents with children under the age of 18 said
they would be interested in fishing during the pandemic.
Even the sales of spring turkey tags are up 40 percent
over the same period in 2019, the information and education section says.
Murnieks did say also in
her audio interview with reporters how agencies which have self-sustaining
revenue sources can continue to spend their dollars but with Budget and
Management input.
And, of course, for the
outdoors community this spending will be shepherded by the Ohio Department of
Natural Resources. And direction is what the Natural Resources Department
intends to, too, says Wickham.
“The announced budget cuts will be absorbed
by delaying projects and foregoing purchases that were planned for this year,
such as vehicles and equipment,” Wickham said.
“With the stay-at-home order, we have also
reduced the amount of hours that our temporary, seasonal staff would have
otherwise worked.”
Howbeit, Wickham did not elaborate as to
which projects will be shelved for now, possibly including any further land
purchases of the former AEP property in southeast Ohio.
Wickham was asked also whether the Natural
Resources Department has begun with the presumption that more fiscal
blood-letting will come with the 2021 Fiscal Year revenue and expenditure
streams.
She did not respond to inquiries about either
point in time for this story, however.
It should be noted as well
that earlier in the on-going COVID-19 process,
Governor DeWine had announced a hiring and promotion freeze across the board.
- Jeffrey L. Frischkorn
JFrischk@Ameritech.net
JFrischk4@gmail.com
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