Interim Director presents preliminary PHHS budget
Public Health and Human Services Interim Director and Fiscal Supervisor Plamen Dimitrov presented the preliminary 2026 department budget during the August board meeting. The cost to the county is projected at $3,123,977, an increase of 3.7% from 2025.
While the increase in expenses seems small, the preliminary budget requests a levy 27.8% higher than the approved levy for 2025. That is largely due to Dimitrov’s recommendation that the budget avoid using money from the Public Health Fund. In 2025, $566,645 was used from the fund balance to pay for out-of-home services and wage enhancements as part of the child care subsidies program.
“Fiscal policy requires us to maintain at least 42% of the expenditures for a calendar year,” Dimitrov told WTIP. “When the estimated fund balance as of 2025 is compared to the 2026 preliminary expenditures. That number is 44% which gets us closer to the minimum required. We have intentionally budgeted the use of fund balance over the last three years, a total of $1,790,000, to reduce the levy impact. But for 2026, I recommend no use of fund balance to ensure that we adhere to the 42% minimum policy.”
The budget includes staff reductions, with one public health educator reduced from 40 hours a week to 20 and an economic assistant case aid reduced from 40 to 32 hours.
“We do have mandated services that we provide to the community, so any staff changes that we make will have to be reviewed and approved by the board. What I see as my team and I can do as a direct impact is to increase revenues,” Dimitrov told WTIP. ” And we are working very hard to make sure that we are billing for services we provide to clients and for time recorded by our team in systems, so we can offset the expenditures that we have with an increased revenue.
Additional budget concerns were expressed regarding staff training and travel expenses, which rose by 149% under economic assistance and 133% under social services. Dimitrov said the increases reflect required staff training and travel related to client visits.
“Staff turnover in various positions in 2025 is resulting in lower projected payroll cost, but also will likely result in increased training and travel costs,” Dimitrov explained while presenting his budget to the PHHS board during their August meeting. “In the last several years, we received COVID-related grants in the public health and allocated ARPA funding to emergency response and recovery staff and services in public health. Those funds are no longer available.”
Other impacts to the budget presented during the August meeting included cost-of-living adjustments, reclassified positions in 2025, and uncertainty about state and federal revenue allocations.
While some revenue sources are no longer available and others remain uncertain, the preliminary budget still anticipates an increase in 2026.
“The largest increase in revenue is under the Social Services Department, and that is due to the Mobile Crisis Response grant with the Minnesota Department of Human Services to provide a mandated service,” Dimitrov told WTIP. “That alone drove the revenue projections up for the year 2026.”
The Cook County Board of Commissioners passed the preliminary budget for 2026, which would set the levy increase at 7.57%.
Josh Hinke September 13, 2025
