GUILFORD COUNTY, N.C. — Guilford County now knows how it wants to spend your money.
The county manager's budget proposal comes out to a whopping 831 million dollars.
Among the big items, it does not call for a property tax increase.
The new budget for Guilford County still needs to be approved but we are looking deeper at where that money could go.
2 million dollars would go towards pay for deputy sheriff and detention officers in the county.
The goal is to address the vacancy rates and increase pay to align with other agencies.
3 million dollars would go into mental health, behavioral health, and medical services for the detention centers in High Point and Greensboro.
The biggest chunk of the budget goes to education. 46 percent goes to both Guilford County Schools and Guilford Technical Community College.
GTCC president Dr. Anthony Clarke said GTCC would get 19 million dollars of the 453.3 million dollars allotted to education.
"From a budget perspective, it's the salary increase, we want to make sure that we're paying our people as best we can, so we appreciate that even the budget that has been presented gives us enough money to match our state's salary increase," said Clarke. "The operating expenses, utility rates, and the insurance rates, obviously, we'd like to have enough money for that, which is about another $400,000. I think the current budget is short of that, but we have a good staff that works with us on trying to save money here and there."
In 2025, the county is asking GTCC to use its reserve funding for its capital needs to lower its budget.
GCS would get the largest piece of the education funding.
Superintendent Dr. Oakley said the district is asking for 40 million dollars more than last year. It's for legislatively mandated increases like retirement and insurance.
GCS would also use the money for higher salaries, safety strategies, and tutoring programs.
"There are capital items that cannot be we can't use bond dollars for," said Oakley. "Bond dollars are really for system replacements. We still have repairs we have to pay for at our more than 300 buildings. So that plus the compensation for teachers and our frontline workers. That's what's included in the increase."
Nothing is final until the budget goes up for a vote on June 20th.