Board of Finance elects 2026 officers and accepts treasurer's report

The first Board of Finance meeting of 2026 featured the election of the Board of Finance officers for 2026, and an overview of the treasurer’s report. President Nancy Coats began the meeting with the election of officers.

Nancy Coats was retained as president, and LaDonna Briscoe was retained as secretary.

“The next item is the treasurer's report,” said Nancy Coats. “You all have a copy in your folder if you want to follow along with me. In 2025, we had four of our investments that matured, and we gained a total amount of interest of $163,145.45. Washington County currently has four investments, two of them mature this year. The other ones are a 24 month and a 60 month note that mature later. So, we will have a Board of Finance meeting concerning those. Probably three weeks to a month beforehand. I try to make it closer just because the rates change so much that if we get it closer, we'll know pretty well what the rate will be when they mature. And one of those is in May and one of them is in September. The monthly bank balances are in your report attached. 2025 interest: From all our bank accounts, we gained a total of $1,196,216.78. There are written reports on those with the interest on your bank statements. Our 2025 report of collections: We have AFCS, which does our collection for delinquent taxes on personal property and mobile homes, our copy money, or mobile home permits, and our innkeepers tax. There are written reports in your folder on each of those.

“Outstanding checks over two years old: the treasurer and the auditor's office have contacted the owners of outstanding checks, and as of 12/31/25, there were zero outstanding checks over two years old,” continued Coats. “Lockbox collections went very smoothly this year. It's probably the first year I haven't had any major mistakes. I wanted to see what you all think about this. Because the problem was primarily with the other first savings banks, when people would take Washington County payment coupons to, for instance, the Corydon branch, they didn't get them back to the Salem branch for them to be recorded. So we started two years ago when this was going on because there were over five of them that happened. And then somebody looked in a pile of envelopes and found the payments. We changed it to where they could only make their payments at the Salem branch. No other first savings bank locations. I feel better, and everything went very smoothly this year. I'd like to keep it that way unless you guys have a different opinion. Some people do live in Clark County or whatever, and they can just go to that one. There weren't that many of them, but it did become quite a bit of a problem. And of course, we didn't find out until we sent out our delinquent letters. And then we had people calling us saying, ‘I paid at Clark County,’ and it was a lot of work to get it resolved. But everything else has been going really well, and there have been a lot of payments here. In the spring, it's close to 600,000, and in the fall we had 420,000.

“Delinquent taxpayers: when LaDonna first ran it, we had 1,744 parcels that had delinquent taxes to the tune of $1,392,996.59,” she added. “Now, we started sending out courtesy letters, delinquent notices, and we always get a lot of payments because people didn't change their address or whatever the reason. That's a little higher than it usually is. But, as of January 13th, we have 1,186 parcels with delinquent taxes of $1,090,588.91. So, about 300,000 have paid since we sent out the delinquent letters. And we're still getting people coming in every day. And a lot of people are paying on their credit cards, so we have a lot bigger credit card payments right now.”

“Are you having any problems getting people to understand that they're supposed to get a permit every time they move a mobile home?” asked Todd Ewen.

“If they come in or they call and inquire that they have to pay $10 to have a moving permit or a title transfer,” replied Coats. “And most people are aware of that, but we still have people that call and they had no idea and they moved it to Timbuktu. But it's hit and miss on that. And I can't make an educated guess on that because it's only if they call us or inquire. Now, it's something I could put in the paper every once in a while. 'Just wanted to make Washington County residents aware. If you are going to move your mobile home or you've sold it to someone, you must contact the treasurer's office to do the proper paperwork.' But most of them know it because they have to go to the BMV to get the title changed, and the BMV won't accept it without our paperwork.”

Tony Cardwell then made the motion to accept the treasurer’s report, seconded by Todd Ewen, and the board unanimously passed the motion.

“Are there any other items that need to be discussed?” asked Coats.

“Total of all monies on this first page – the lower part – that's the total of all monies in our investments?” Ewen asked.

“Yes. Right now we have $5.55 million,” Coats said. “And I look at the bank balances because I have to go by the state statute that says I can only have a certain percentage of my portfolio in investments. So, the one in May will happen before taxes– well, we'll have them in there so it will probably be a little bit higher. The September one too. Because we send out so much money at settlement, settlement always affects how much we have available. And of course the rates aren't as favorable right now. Hopefully they'll go up some before we– that's why I sort of want to really lock into something, if we can get something because we've got three that are in the threes and only one that's four. And years before, they were in the fives. 5.75 or something.”

“This $5.5 million total includes the $2 million we put up for the loan on the highway department, right?” Ewen asked.

“Yes. The 60 month treasury note is the $2 million that we used as collateral for that. And that doesn’t mature until 2029,” Coats said.

With no further discussion, Nancy Coats then asked for a motion to adjourn the meeting.