Washburn County Board District 1 Supervisor Michael Bobin said the board currently faces many financial issues but, “We’ve been pretty creative. We’re paying off debt, refinancing and doing the right things with the money.”
Bobin said it was a difficult decision to deny Washburn County Sheriff Terry Dryden’s request for two more officers.
“We just didn’t have the money,” Bobin said. “It’s expensive. In addition to the wages, you have benefits, a new squad car and the costs of maintenance and gas, and we just couldn’t do it. But it’s important and we need to find a way.”
Bobin said Sheriff Dryden requested two more officers and a current part-time officer to be elevated full-time. The board only approved moving the officer to full-time.
“We need to find a way to get more sheriff’s deputies, we definitely need it,” Bobin said.
Dryden said the county is short of deputies and for that reason he wasn’t able to provide a youth officer to the Northwood School in Minong. Bobin said the school lies in the Minong Township so the village and the town crafted an agreement that allows the village to send their police chief, Dennis Stewart, to be the school youth officer.
In other county-related business, Bobin said that Human Services is in need of more space but the county is out of space. He said the Aging office also needs space. He said the UW-Extension office is doing some reorganizing and may have some space available.
“It’s tentative right now but the extension office may be moving over to Forestry and we’ll be moving Forestry over to the Annex building,” Bobin said.
A 5-year plan the board is looking at is to rent the old dentist office next to the county building for a 5-year lease and move Human Services, Health and the Aging office into that building.
“Over that five years, we’ll pay down enough debt so that we can build a new building,” Bobin said. He added that space is an ongoing problem for the county.
Bobin said Washburn County suffered about $1.5 million in damage during the July storms and only some of that money came back from FEMA.
“We took a hit fixing trails and roads,” Bobin said. He said one road was completely washed out and had to be closed. “Residents weren’t happy but if a road is unsafe, it’s unsafe.” The residents didn’t care and just want the road fixed, but Bobin said it would take a while.
“Our roads weren’t too badly damaged from the storm. The ATV trails are what suffered the most damage and that’s where we’re putting a lot of the money.”
Last Update: Oct 17, 2016 9:31 am CDT
