San Andreas, CA…During the October 17 and 18 Board of Supervisors’ Hearings to consider the adoption of an ordinance to either ban or regulate cannabis cultivation in the County, there was some confusion regarding how much unobligated funds Calaveras County has available at its disposal.

Specifically, it was stated that there was an excess of $30 million dollars in reserve funds and over $130 million in the County treasury that could be tapped into in order to shore up any budget deficits. Unfortunately, that is not the case as these funds are not available for general use within the County.

The County treasury is made up of general and non-general fund monies. General fund monies are discretionary and can be used to fund some general governmental purposes. Alternatively, special use funds (also known as “designated funds”) are restricted and can only be used for their specifically stated purpose. The County operates over one hundred different designated funds, with total combined balances of over $50 million. These designated funds are separated from the County General Fund specifically because they are not discretionary nor should they be co-mingled with discretionary funds.

Much of the money in these designated funds are designed for specific services to clients or recipients of government aid; others are allowable only to conduct certain activities. Examples include Mental Health Services Act funds, CalWORKs assistance funds, funds to support criminal justice programs such as the Sheriff’s Office, Probation, and District Attorney, and funds collected by Departments specifically tied to capital improvement or modernization activities. In all but a few cases, these designated funds can only support cost increases in the Departments that operate the funds.

It should also be noted that in addition to its own general and non-general fund monies, the County maintains in its treasury the funds for school districts and a variety of special districts that operate in the County. Therefore, while it may appear that there is a large sum of money in the County Treasury, much of the funds are not available to the County for use in any way.