Wednesday, June 9, 2004

Are pencils campaign material? By JOHN THOMPSON jthompson@TheCitizenNews.com When she entered the room Monday night, probably the last thing on Superior Court Clerk Sheila Studdard’s mind was pencils. But after she had gone through her budget presentation with the Fayette County Commission, she probably wanted to erase the pencil issue. Studdard came under a little bit of fire for pencils in her office. County Commissioner Linda Wells objected to Studdard having her name stamped on the pencils. “It just looks like advertising to me that’s being paid for with county tax money,” Wells said. But Studdard said that pencils with writing on them have a habit of staying in the office, while plainer pencils seem to disappear. “We’ve really had only two pencil orders since I’ve been there,” she said. It was suggested the next pencil order should just have “Clerk of Superior Court” written on them, and Studdard’s name removed. Other than the pencil snafu, Studdard got most of what she was asking for in her budget. The county agreed to make a separate line item for deed books, which Studdard said is one of the biggest expenses in her office supply budget. In 2003, Studdard used 372 of the $140-each books for an expense of $52,080. She questioned why staff had recommended cutting her office supply budget from a requested $95,000 to $57,000, which would barely cover the cost of the deed books. So far this year, Studdard has recorded 55,000 real estate filings. The staff agreed to prepare a separate line item for the books, and to reexamine the issue during a mid-year budget review. Studdard was also pleased the staff agreed with her recommendation to hire three part-time county clerks. But Studdard was also cautioned that if she was adding employees, her overtime levels should decrease. She had originally requested $20,000 in overtime, which the county slashed to $10,000. Monday night, the county slashed it in half to $5,000 and said that issue would be examined again in a mid-year budget session.