The county will close out the 2017 budget by balancing it with an additional $6.3 million in fund balance.

Kathleen Dennison, Chautauqua County budget director, presented 2017 year-end results of the general fund at Thursday morning’s county legislature Audit and Control meeting. Dennison said the year ended with a deficit of almost $7 million, however, the actual results are closer to $6.3 million.

“We still have a deficit, but we’re still better than budget,” she said

Several areas of revenue were lower than budgeted, including property taxes, loss on property auctions, interest and penalties and other areas. Dennison said jail inmate revenue fell $178,000. There was a budget for 30 inmates per day, but there were only 27.5 per day.

The county Fly Car System was under budget about $268,000 because the revenue was not what was budgeted. Chairman Pierre Chagnon said he had formulated a list of questions regarding the Fly Car System that he wanted to deliver to the county Emergency Medical Services department.

“I put together a list of question trying to understand what has changed from the original study and proposal that was done,” Chagnon said. “Because, if we are looking at a quarter of a million dollar deficit in the Fly Car Program that we were told was going to be self-sustaining, we need to understand what has changed from the original proposal, in my opinion.”

Chagnon said he would give the questions to EMS, with the permission of the Audit and Control Committee and the Public Safety Committee.

Terry Niebel, Public Safety Committee chairman, said the program is not collecting the revenue that was anticipated.

“Were we too optimistic on the revenue projections?” Niebel said. “It appears that we were.”

In other news, the committee approved a resolution that requests that the Chautauqua County Industrial Development Agency approve “no further PILOT agreements of any kind for large wind energy projects with a rate capacity of 5 Megawatts or greater.”

The resolution is sponsored by Legislators Robert Scudder, R- Dunkirk, and Charles Nazzaro, D-Jamestown and County Executive George Borrello. Borrello said it does not mean that large wind projects cannot be built, but it would force them to be applied for through a state process known as the Article 10 process, which provides a review of new and repowered or modified electric generating facilities in the state by the Board on Electric Generation Siting and the Environment.

The resolution will go before the full legislature Wednesday at 6:30 p.m. on the third floor of the Gerace Office Building in Mayville.