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The Escambia County Commission approved its fiscal year 2020 budget at its Monday meeting in Brewton.

“We have worked really hard on it and we have a final draft in front of you today,” said Commissioner Raymond Wiggins. The budget passed with a unanimous vote.

Next, the board voted to approve the FY 2020 holiday schedule. The new schedule will include 14 paid holidays instead of 11. The schedule was approved. Additionally, the commission awarded annual bids for the county.

In closing remarks, District 4 Commissioner Brandon Smith commended those that had worked on the FY 2020 budget.

During final remarks, District 5 Commissioner Karean Reynolds brought forth his concerns about an issue occurring within his district.

“The city of Atmore is working to annex a part of District 5, which includes business property and farm property just outside of Atmore,” Reynolds said. “After speaking to residents, businesses and property owners, I would like to motion our county commission to draft a letter to the city of Atmore and copy our representative and senator on this.”

The commission approved the motion 4-1 to draft a letter expressing its opposition of the annexation. Smith voted against the motion.

Reynolds was referring to the Atmore City Council’s workshop, where an additional annexation and territory, connecting Rivercane Development with downtown, was discussed.

Reynolds said the reason why the county commission acted as a body was to protect the property interest of the business and landowners in the land just outside of Atmore.

“Residents expressed numerous concerns about being subjected to the jurisdiction of Atmore and excluded from the election process,” Reynolds said. “Their roads and right of ways would be governed by the city.”

Mayor Jim Staff said Tuesday the city isn’t considering the annexation of the property.

Smith said during the commission meeting the reason he voted no on the letter was simply because he’s had a lot of conversations with the city, and they stressed to me that this will not be an issue.

“These people have legitimate concerns,” Reynolds said. “A letter opposing it, would be a strong message to them.”

Smith said Monday the reason why he voted against the drafting of the letter is because several years ago when the county was in bad financial shape, the cities helped them out with a 1-cent sales tax.

“We had made 30 percent cuts across the board,” he said. “We had hiring freezes going on. Even on our side of it, as bad as that was, we still had constituents that needed roads fixed, bridges repaired — the whole nine yards.

“We explored different options to generate some revenue, and as a last resort, we talked about maybe a 1-cent sales tax to help with our infrastructure problems and to make the county whole again,” he said. “Every mayor in Escambia County supported the 1-cent sales tax.”

Smith said today, there isn’t any hiring freeze anymore, and the county has been able to hire more people to serve the taxpayers.

“We’ve finally got an infrastructure program in place,” he said. “We’re paving roads, and got plans to finish up more of them. We’ve still got some bad ones out there. I didn’t forget any of it.”

Smith said if the annexation is something that is actually going forward, he’d probably feel differently, but at this point, the city hasn’t taken any action on it.

“This is something they’ve been talking about the last 10 years,” he said. “I couldn’t see when somebody that has helped you when you’re really down — and needed help — I couldn’t see drafting a letter that would have a negative connotation to the city. I don’t take Mr. Reynolds’ concerns lightly. Annexation affects all of us, not just district 5. I knew at this point (Monday), that no action that had been taken, and there are a lot of steps to take. That could’ve been killed long before the county commission got involved. Now, we’re going to draft a letter that could potentially put a bad taste in a lot of mouths we have good relationships with.”

Smith said he doesn’t mean any disrespect to Reynolds.