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<br />2025-04-17 MINUTES 1 <br /> <br />KITTITAS COUNTY <br />FINANCE STUDY SESSION MINUTES <br />BOCC CONFERENCE ROOM, 205 WEST 5TH ROOM 108 - ELLENSBURG <br />Regular Meeting <br /> <br />THURSDAY 1:30PM April 17, 2025 <br /> <br />Board members present: Chairman Laura Osiadacz via Webex, Commissioner Cory Wright- <br />Absent & Commissioner Brett Wachsmith <br />Staff Present: Brian Auditor, Bryan Elliott, Treasurer, Amy Cziske, Kylee Wuesthoff, Andrew <br />Yoder, Sue Patterson, Josh Fredrickson, Reid Burbank <br />Others: Pat Kelleher <br /> <br />1. Call to Order: 1:30PM <br />2. Citizen Comments – Pat Kelleher <br />Comments from Pat Kelleher are as follows: Revenues exceeded expense by over $4Million <br />budget year 2024. Suggests, earned interest go exclusively to deferred maintenance or retire debt. <br />Implement immediate hire freeze county wide. BOCC approval for any personnel change <br />affecting budget. Options: Permanently remove position, remove position from current budget <br />year, fill with overtime, fill with contractor, fill with down transfer, fill with a lateral transfer, fill <br />with up transfer. Recruit for position. <br /> <br />3. Finance Update: 2026 Strategic Planning <br />Mr. Elliott reviewed the 2026 Strategic Plan including the Unassigned Fund Balance. Chairman <br />Laura Osiadcz discussed the Lodging Tax balance is over $10MM and the Lodging Tax <br />committee has made recommendations to spend $10M this year and $5M next year. The <br />Unrestricted General Fund is broken up in three different categories being Capacity is $30MM, <br />Caution is between $20-10MM and $10MM to Zero is in the Critical category. Commissioners <br />were supportive of this idea and would like to see this for Enterprise funds. <br />History and forecast of Reet 1 and Reet 2 will be updated by Zack DeHaven at the next meeting. <br />Auditors and Human Resources are in the process of making a policy to implement a freeze to <br />vacancies if ever needed. A hiring freeze exception request form has been drafted for <br />Department heads and offices to use for requesting an exception to policy. <br />Direct Interest to General fund was discussed and Treasurer Amy Cziske would like to have a <br />meeting with Finance to develop a recommendation to bring to the BOCC before the 2026 <br />budget.