YOUNGSTOWN — Mahoning County commissioners will have $46.7 million to spend in the county’s general fund in 2025, a 7.4% increase from the 2024 appropriation of $44.1 million.

It means there will be room for some cost increases for health care and other inflationary increases when the county budget is approved in the coming weeks, Commissioner Anthony Traficanti said Wednesday at the end of the first budget hearing for next year’s spending plan.

The general fund covers most of the major county departments, including the courts, commissioners’, auditor’s, treasurer’s and recorder’s offices, and the board of elections.

The certification for the criminal and administrative justice fund is 2.8% higher for 2025, a result of the “projected leveling of sales tax revenue,” said Jen Pangio, director of the county’s Office of Management and Budget. It is rising to $40.1 million, compared to last year’s $39 million.

“The goal is to bring continued stability to the justice fund through 2025 with conservative revenue estimates,” she said.

She said the county will continue to have an adequate “stabilization reserve” in the general fund and justice fund in 2025.

At this time last year, the revenue certifications were 5.4% higher for the general fund than in 2023 and 8.3% higher for the criminal justice fund over 2023.

As usual, most departments asked commissioners for a larger amount of funding for 2025 than the amount of revenue available. The total of requests for the general fund was $51.3 million, which is about $3.7 million more than the amount certified as being available.

The justice fund requests are $42 million, which is about $2 million more than the amount certified as being available. The criminal justice fund pays for the sheriff’s office and jail, coroner’s and prosecutor’s offices and county 911.

In the coming weeks, commissioners will work to “bring general fund budgets in line with projected revenues,” they said in a statement. Commissioners also will continue to lobby state officials and “work with the County Commissioners Association for the return of lost state allocated revenues to lessen the impact on local governments,” they stated.

The first department to meet with commissioners was Mahoning County Juvenile Court, which had a budget request of $7.9 million for 2025, up $1.1 million from the $6.8 million commissions appropriated last year.

Juvenile Court Judge Theresa Dellick said her budget reflects higher salaries, especially for workers in the detention facility, because those employees have been hired away by the state prisons and other facilities.

Some have remained at the detention facility for many years, and she feels it is because her employees are “mission oriented” and “those who work in our detention facility are dedicated to our youth and rehabilitating them. They go through a lot of training.”

She said the facility houses “public safety threat students, those who have committed harm against the public, not against property. Our facility has been full. I can’t afford to lose anybody.”

Commissioners do not meet with every department for a budget hearing, but they have hearings set for noon today with the domestic court; 10 a.m. Wednesday with the sheriff’s office; and 11 a.m. Wednesday with the clerk of courts.

Budget hearings are open to the public and are conducted in the county commissioners’ conference room in the county administration building, 21 W. Boardman St., next door to the county courthouse.