Service Level Changes (Staffing)
Washington County’s most valuable resources are its employees. The 2022 budget funds 1,386.26 full-time equivalent (FTE) positions, which is a net increase of 22.91 FTE over the 2021 year-end complement. When combined, personnel services make up the largest component of the 2022 budget at $139.4 million, or about 68 percent of the county’s operating budget. When developing the annual budget, negotiated labor settlements play a large role in the growth of expenditures and in determining how much funding will be available for approved budget requests.
As part of the annual budget review process, departmental personnel budgets are reduced to account for anticipated vacant positions. Through close monitoring of the county’s budget, it was found that unspent personnel budgets, as a result of positions that were vacant at various intervals throughout the year, could be repurposed towards other high-priority needs.
The 2022 budget includes a .5 percent vacancy savings rate reduction for departments with fewer than 50 FTE, and a one percent vacancy savings rate reduction for departments with more than 50 FTE. These vacancy reduction rates yielded significant operating budget savings of $1,145,600 for 2022, and allowed available funding to go towards other needed programs and services.
The following pages include graphs and charts to illustrate how Washington County’s staffing complement is spread throughout the county, a discussion of staffing level changes in the adopted 2022 budget, and a four-year history of positions by department.
Employees by Function
2022 Budgeted Full-Time Equivalents
1,386.26
Position Summary Schedule
2019-2022 Full-Time Equivalent (FTE) Comparison
2022 Staffing Level Changes
2022 Staffing Change Summary
The 2022 budget began when the Board of Commissioners approved guidelines, goals, and objectives for department directors to use while preparing their budget requests. This foundational strategic direction helped focused the allocation of financial resources towards identifying new positions to best support the priorities identified in the 2022 budget. The adopted budget includes the addition of 25.91 new positions of which three other positions were eliminated for a net increase of 21.91 positions funded in the 2022 budget.