Arapahoe County adopts 27‑item supplemental budget, including election pay and IT storage purchases

The Arapahoe County Board of Commissioners on Sept. 8 adopted a 27‑item supplemental appropriation for the 2026 budget after a staff presentation and no public comment.

Lisa Stairs, senior budget analyst in county finance, walked commissioners through the highlights, including a sheriff's office vehicle retention request of $18,000, a Clerk and Recorder request of $60,000 to increase election judge hourly pay, and a transfer of $7,850 for coroner equipment. "The first one we're request the sheriff's office is requesting a transfer of $18,000 from their operating budget within the general fund to the central services fund for the retention of a vehicle," Stairs said during the presentation.

Stairs also identified a request to recognize and appropriate $770,600 for the county attorney's new alert system subscription and implementation, $521,838 in IT disk‑storage assets being brought back from the cloud, a placeholder reimbursement of $105,000 from local planning capacity grants, and a de‑carbonization grant placeholder of $898,250. Public Works listed a combined $11.2 million federal/city/partner contribution for a Highline Canal underpass; the county's portion was already budgeted at $800,000, staff said.

There were no public commenters during the hearing on the supplemental, and Commissioner Campbell moved to adopt the resolution with Commissioner Fields seconding. The motion passed on a voice vote.

The appropriation package included both revenue‑neutral housekeeping items and new appropriations; staff said they reviewed the supplements at an Aug. 10 study session. For several aggregated totals mentioned in the presentation the staff record included figures that were not read aloud or that appeared garbled in the transcript; commissioners asked no substantive questions during the hearing and directed staff to continue implementation and follow‑up as needed.