County budgets and businesses will take a minor hit as a result of District Health Department No. 4’s decision to ask for more county appropriations, and higher service fees.

The department opted at the end of 2014 to ask Alpena, Cheboygan, Montmorency and Presque Isle counties for an extra $17,240 split between the four, Health Officer John Bruning said. Overall the department will get $591,902 in county contributions in 2015, up from $574,662 the year previous.

This amounts to a 3 percent increase, Bruning said, and along with higher service fees for health inspections and other department services was approved by the department’s board. The department has numerous other funding sources, and county contributions account for between 10 and 15 percent of the department’s funding.

For Alpena County, that’s an increase of about $3,500 at a time when the county is facing a massive deficit. Commissioner Bob Adrian, who is a DHD board member, said it comes at a time when every dollar counts.

“It wasn’t a huge amount, but we started the year with a projected deficit of hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars,” he said. “We have to get back to some sort of balanced budget for this fiscal year, and this just made things that much tighter.”

Businesses also will be impacted by higher fees for services the health department offers, Adrian said. That includes water well and sewer permits, restaurant inspections and others. Alpena County has to pay some of these fees, and while they do add a burden to business owners they help cover the costs of valuable services it provides to the public.

Increases in county contributions should help the health department meet what Bruning called “the cost of doing business.” With operation costs on the rise, the department also has taken several steps over the years to curb expenses. That includes layoffs, shrinking the payroll by not replacing retired employees, and in past years, furlough days. The department also has switched retirement plans for new employees and asked current ones to pay more toward their health insurance costs.

Like many public agencies the health department is affected by flagging state funding, Bruning said. Economic uncertainties and cuts, followed by restorations, make for an uncertain financial future. And while the department is always on the lookout for grants and other funding, they’re far from guaranteed.

“The future is challenging. It’s really not clear at this point but it’s certainly challenging,” he said.

These proposed increases were approved by all four counties after the department came up with its current budget in November, Adrian said. While the contribution and fee increases are likely to have their impact, the department must struggle with a balancing act each year at budget time.

“Obviously you’ve got to balance between providing the services that keep the public safe, versus how much you charge the business owners to do those inspections, and how much do we subsidize the health department budget from the counties in order to accomplish that,” he said.

Jordan Travis can be reached via email at jtravis@thealpenanews.com or by phone at 358-5688. Follow Jordan on Twitter @jt_alpenanews. Read his blog, A Snowball’s Chance, at www.thealpenanews.com.