Welcome to Skagit County

July 15, 2026

County Commissioners Adopt 2027 Budget Priorities, Launch Live Budget Transparency Website

In preparation for the annual budget process, the Skagit County Commissioners have adopted a resolution with objectives for the development of the 2027 budget. This annual resolution helps provide departments and elected offices with guidance and constraints as to how they should prepare budget requests for the following year. Local governments in Washington state are required to adopt a balanced budget.

The County Commissioners are committed to providing an open and transparent budget process for the community each year. In order to share financial information in a more accessible manner, the County has launched Euna OpenBook, an interactive website to allow residents and interested stakeholders to review preliminary budgets, adopted budgets, and previous actual expense and revenue reports, including live, monthly updates of actual expense and revenues. Residents may now visit the site to review actual revenue and expenses from 2024 – 2026. The preliminary 2027 budget information will be available online by November 23, 2026.

“We are excited to offer our financial information in a more user-friendly way to Skagit County,” said Commissioner Peter Browning. “The annual budget is how we show our priorities and how the public keeps us accountable. It’s vital that people can see exactly how their tax dollars are used and the source of funding for each program and service.”

Skagit County continues to face a significant structural budget imbalance. If the 2027 budget were adopted with the same service level as 2026, grown with inflation, current projections indicate there would be an approximate $10 million deficit in the General Fund for 2027. This deficit is not the result of a single decision, department, or economic event, rather it reflects a continuing trend in which expenditure growth is outpacing sustainable revenue growth. The County will be evaluating long-term sustainable changes to services and programs to ensure financial stability. In 2025 and 2026, Skagit County eliminated 94 staff positions, implemented voluntary furloughs and a permanent hiring freeze, offered an incentive for voluntary separation that directly resulted in a budget savings, and eliminated or reduced discretionary programs; however, these reductions are not sufficient to overcome the limited revenue available to county governments for operations.

Local governments are largely funded through property taxes, which are limited to a 1% overall increase per year, plus new construction, due to Initiative 747. The cost of goods and services increases each year between 3 – 5%, significantly outpacing yearly revenue increases. The Commissioners recognize that available ongoing revenues may not be sufficient to sustain remaining programs and service levels. County staff will be evaluating which programs and services are legally mandated, operationally necessary, strategic priorities, benefit the community, along with the availability of sustainable funding sources.

“When we adopted the 2026 budget, former Chair Janicki acknowledged up front to the public and county leadership that we were not done making reductions to our staffing levels and services,” said Commissioner Ron Wesen, Chair of the Skagit Board of County Commissioners. “Our inability to increase our revenue sources on par with cost increases has led to this moment where we are having to make very difficult choices on our service levels to the public. It is truly unfortunate that we are here, but we will make the changes necessary to put us back on good financial footing.”

In order to ensure long-term financial sustainability of County government and preserve the County’s ability to provide essential services in the future, departments and elected officials have been assigned a required general fund reduction target. Each general fund department is expected to submit a budget reduction plan in their preliminary 2027 budget request. These proposed reductions will include organizational, operational and service level changes based on leadership expertise, which will have an impact on the availability of county services to the public. The County Commissioners additionally adopted several objectives to help evaluate 2027 requests:

The General Fund budget shall be balanced within available revenue sources, with a targeted minimum reserve balance of 20% of expenditures.
The 2027 budget shall be developed with the objective of achieving long-term structural balance between ongoing revenues and expenditures.
Departments shall evaluate all programs, services, staffing, and operational activities for service prioritizations and maintaining core functions of government.
All department budget submittals, programs, services, grants, and fee-supported activities shall include the application of the County’s approved indirect cost allocation methodology for 2027 budget development.
Departments shall review all fees, charges for service, intergovernmental reimbursements, permits, licenses, and other revenue sources to ensure recovery of the full cost of providing services whenever legally permissible.
Requests for new or expanded programs, services, staffing, and/or ongoing expenditures shall only be considered when fully funded and sustainable, consistent with the county strategic plan, and demonstrated not to increase future General Fund obligations.
Departments shall identify all grant match requirements, ongoing obligations, staffing impacts, indirect cost implications, and long-term sustainability concerns associated with grant-funded programs.
Departments shall evaluate opportunities to collaborate, consolidate, share services, or partner with other governmental entities and organizations when such efforts improve efficiency, reduce costs, or avoid duplication of services.

Skagit County understands that reductions approved through the 2027 budget process will have a substantial impact on the availability of programs and services offered through county offices. For example, the public should anticipate less funding available for service counter hours, road maintenance and repairs, and discretionary services. Identifying programs as discretionary does not mean the program is not beneficial, but they are services that are not mandated to be provided by county governments. Unfortunately, the County will need to reduce or eliminate valuable discretionary services in order to ensure we can adopt balanced budgets with sufficient reserves in our General Fund.

“The changes we have made thus far have reduced our deficit projections by over $9M; however, we still need to adopt a significant amount of expense reductions to be financially sustainable,” said Commissioner Joe Burns. “We hope to make these reductions through a phased approach in 2027 and 2028, in order to reduce the overall impact to our constituents, but we want to be clear that there will be services we have provided in the past that will have to change or no longer be available because of our revenue imbalance. We appreciate the community’s feedback on this process each year, and we will continue to advocate to our legislators for additional ways to fund needed services for the community.”

To review the full list of priorities and objectives for the 2027 county budget, please read Resolution #20260132. Additional information regarding the 2027 budget process, including important dates and resolutions, is available on our website: www.skagitcounty.net/2027Budget. Work sessions to review preliminary budgets will be scheduled and announced later this summer.

Questions or comments regarding the 2027 budget process can be directed to the Commissioners’ office at commissioners@co.skagit.wa.us or 360-416-1300.