As area localities wrestle with how to cut from already slim budgets, a new effort with Region 2000 is taking shape to find ways to combine government services to save money.
Representatives from nine area localities met recently to discuss a number of partnership ideas and came up with a list of services that could be regionalized, such as area landfills and jails. Two key contenders would combine area libraries and government office needs such as payroll and computer maintenance, said Campbell County Administrator David Laurrell.
Campbell County supervisors discussed those options during their meeting Monday night and told Laurrell to continue looking at the ideas with Region 2000’s Local Government Council.
“When we think about Region 2000 in the context of having 250,000 or 260,000 people, it doesn’t really make sense to have some of these services that we provide have five or six different individual groups doing that,” Laurrell said. “Possibly instead of having five different library (systems,) maybe we could have one that services the entire population.”
Other ideas include combining erosion and sediment control management, animal shelters, broadband authorities, public utilities and emergency medical services, Laurrell said.
Not every locality would need to participate in each regionalization effort, Laurrell said. “It just has to be on a large enough scale to work.”
Bedford and Amherst counties did not participate in the regional landfill efforts and Appomattox County did not join until after the regional service authority formed.
All efforts are in early planning stages, but the focus is on which would provide the largest amount of savings and efficiency for those localities involved, Laurrell said.
Rustburg District Supervisor Hugh Pendleton said regionalization efforts have been discussed many times, “but we’re getting to a point where the dollars are going to outweigh (individual interests) and we’re going to have to compromise on things we did not want to do in order to make ends meet.”
Email
Facebook
Google
Twitter
Favorites
More
Advertisement