COMING MONDAY: A look at the candidates for Trumbull County Engineer

WARREN — Trumbull voters will determine Nov. 5 whether to support renewal of three levies and a replacement levy during next month’s general election.

Trumbull County Senior Services is seeking a five-year, 0.75-mill replacement levy that will, if passed, collect an additional $1.2 million a year on top of the $2.4 million being collected from a current levy. It is estimated it will cost the owners of a $100,000 house an additional $10 per year.

The current 0.75-mill levy will end at the end of 2025. If the senior levy is neither renewed nor replaced, the county’s senior programs that provide transportation, recreation and food will not have the funds to continue.

The senior levy will be able to collect more money annually at the same 0.75-millage at which it currently operates because the levy will be based on 2024 property valuations rather than property valuations in 2005 when the tax was first passed.

“We have been operating on the same annual dollar amounts as we were when the tax first passed,” Senior Services Levy Administrator Diane Siskowic-Jurkovic said. “However, the cost of everything has gone up since that time.”

“The cost of labor, food and virtually everything else have gone up,” she said. “We have been able to maintain spending in transportation because the county has been able to obtain other income sources to help in that area.”

Siskowic-Jurkovic said the senior program has a waiting list of at least 200 people to become involved in its homemaker care program.

This program allows senior residents to stay within their homes instead of having to move into assisted living facilities or nursing homes.

The senior services director said she learned that nursing home care for an individual senior could cost around $9,000 a month when she was looking for care for her own mother.

“The extra $10 per month will enable the 200 people on our waiting list to participate in the homemaker care program,” she said. “With the passage of this levy, we’ll be able to provide services for people on the waiting list.”

The senior services levy also provides financial assistance to area SCOPE centers and other senior programs.

Siskowic-Jurkovic said the need for senior services is expected to increase as the county’s senior population continues to grow.

“We have younger family members who are leaving, or already have left the county, calling and asking what can be done for their parents,” she said.

An 11-member volunteer advisory council administers the senior levy.

The three renewals are 10-year levies:

• The Trumbull County Board of Developmental Disabilities’ 2.25-mill levy, which is expected to collect nearly $7.8 million per year. This will be about one-half of the total funds used to support the board. It has a total budget of approximately $25 million, with the rest of the money received from state and federal programs.

The board serves about 1,300 persons on an annual basis.

Superintendent Edward Stark said the need for services has increased over the past 20 years.

The current levy will continue to provide funding through 2025. If it is not renewed, the board will have to begin looking at reducing services, including the possible closing of its school, which serves about 240 children, and the reduction of at least half its staff.

* The Mental Health and Recovery Board’s 1-mill levy will generate $3.4 million per year.

Mental Health and Recovery Board Executive Director April Caraway said the levy is needed in order to continue providing the current level of services.

The renewal levy is based on 2014 property values, so taxpayers wouldn’t see an increase in taxes. It costs the owner of a home appraised at $100,000 about $23 a year.

Caraway previously stated that without the local levy dollars, things like employment services, housing, case management for kids and medication can’ be purchased.

* The Trumbull County Children’s Services 0.8 -mill levy will raise approximately $2.7 million per year. Its renewal will help to provide the current operating revenue. The agency is projecting more than $5 million in costs for caring for children in out of home care. The funding from the 0.8-mill levy will assist the agency in providing out-of-home care to children who need to be removed from their homes.

Children’s Services relies on local taxpayers in order to provide child welfare services to families and children in the county.