Introduction
This report continues the annual reporting of state agency expenditures by county, started in 1991, when the General Appropriations Act required the Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts to report state expenditures by county.
Two sections make up this report. Section I provides a summary of net expenditures by county for major spending categories; a summary and ranking of net expenditures by county; and a table of detailed state expenditures by county. Section II includes similar information by council of government region. In both sections, some expenditures are listed as “unallocable” to Texas counties. Unallocable expenditures include payments to out-of-state and out-of-country vendors and payments that cannot be assigned to a specific Texas county.
This report lists state agencies under each county and planning region in numerical order by an assigned agency code. As a reference, this report includes an alphabetical list of state agencies in Section I-A. Section II-A starts with a map of counties in Texas, followed by a list of counties by state planning region.
Only net expenditures are included in this report, as reflected in the Uniform Statewide Accounting System (USAS). Net expenditures include purchases of goods and services. Net expenditures are limited to those made from accounts held by the Comptroller of Public Accounts’ Treasury Operations, those in the state’s General Revenue Fund, all special funds and all trust funds. This report does not include funds maintained outside the Treasury Operations accounting system or funds held by universities in local banks. Net expenditures in this report exclude purchases of investments; some payments from trust or suspense accounts, such as allocations of local sales tax to cities, counties and transit authorities; benefit payments to retired teachers and state employees; and all types of interfund transfers and repayment of debt principal.
This report presents net expenditures made from a cash accounting system during fiscal 2006, from September 1, 2005, to August 31, 2006. Accrued expenses and encumbrances to counties continue to improve with each report period; therefore the data contained in this report may not be consistent with data from reports from prior years.
In a few cases, an expenditure category may include a negative amount. This may indicate a payment made in a previous fiscal year that has been partially or wholly refunded. Or, it may reflect a minor processing error that was corrected. Due to rounding, some category totals listed in the Introduction’s Major Spending Categories table may not match totals in the Summary of County Expenditures.
Major Spending Categories
The tables in this report list state expenditures in major categories that parallel those used in the 2006 Annual Cash Report:
Intergovernmental Payments include grants to colleges, schools and local governments; distribution of Foundation School Program funds to local school districts; textbooks for public schools; and allocations of mixed beverage taxes to cities and counties.
Labor costs are salaries, wages, employee benefits payments, travel expenses and fees for professional consultant services. Also included is the state’s share of retirement contributions on behalf of state employees and public school teachers.
Public Assistance includes Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), Medicaid, grants-in-aid, child support payments and similar state services.
Highway Construction includes purchases of highway right-of-way and the expenses of constructing the state’s roads and bridges.
Operating Expenses are supplies, maintenance, utilities, rentals, leases, printing and non-capitalized equipment.
Capital Outlay expenditures include aircraft, computer equipment, land and buildings, major improvements to state property, motor vehicles and capitalized purchases of furniture and equipment.
Miscellaneous includes all other expenditures, such as court costs, fees, interest on debt, lottery payments and payment of claims and judgments.
Changes to State Agencies
The 2003 Legislature consolidated health and human service agencies with HB 2292. The consolidation included the Texas Commission for the Blind (Agency 318), Department of Human Services (Agency 324), Texas Rehabilitation Commission (Agency 330), Texas Commission for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing (Agency 335), Texas Department on Aging (Agency 340), Texas Department of Health (Agency 501), Texas Council on Alcohol and Drug Abuse (Agency 517), Health and Human Services Commission (Agency 529), Department of Protective and Regulatory Services (Agency 530), Interagency Council on Early Childhood Intervention (Agency 532), Texas Health Care Information Council (Agency 536) and Department of Mental Health and Mental Retardation (Agency 655).
The name of Agency 530 changed from the Department of Protective and Regulatory Services to the Department of Family and Protective Services effective February 1, 2004. The Legislature gave the Health and Human Services Commission more responsibilities. HB 2292 created three new agencies, the Department of State Health Services (Agency 537), Department of Assistive and Rehabilitative Services (Agency 538) and Department of Aging and Disability Services (Agency 539). These three agencies began operating effective September 1, 2004.
This report includes the three new agencies and some close-out activities under the agency numbers of the abolished agencies.
Changes Affecting State Agencies in Fiscal 2006
Actions of the 2005 Legislature abolished the Workers’ Compensation Commission (Agency 478) and transferred its duties to the new Office of Injured Employee Counsel (Agency 448) and the Texas Department of Insurance (Agency 454). Also, the Office of Injured Employee Counsel (Agency 448) was administratively attached to the Department of Insurance (Agency 454).
Other legislation passed by the 2005 Legislature repealed the Agriculture Resources Protection Authority (Agency 553), abolished the Texas Food and Fibers Commission (Agency 904) and transferred its duties to the Texas Department of Agriculture (Agency 551). The Board of Barber Examiners (Agency 502) and the Cosmetology Commission (Agency 505) were abolished, and their duties were moved to the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation (Agency 452). The Texas Education Agency (Agency 701) assumed responsibility for administration of the Board for Educator Certification (Agency 705), which was abolished by the 2005 Legislature.
The 2005 Legislature changed the name of the Savings and Loan Department to the Department of Savings and Mortgage Lending (Agency 450). The Texas State Board of Medical Examiners was renamed the Texas Medical Board (Agency 503). Activity in this report for the Texas Military Facilities Commission (Agency 406) includes the effect of vetoed appropriations.
Adjustments to the Uniform Statewide Accounting System
The Uniform Statewide Accounting System (USAS) provides most of the data in this report. The Comptroller’s office uses USAS, a computerized accounting system, for controlling and reporting all expenditures for Texas state government. In several instances, inconsistencies between the accounting system’s requirements and the need for an accurate report of state expenditures by county required the Comptroller’s office to adjust the distribution of state expenditures to counties.
The Comptroller’s office takes expenditure data from USAS in the form of vouchers submitted by state agencies for payment of goods and services. Vouchers, which carry a citation of the legal authority for the payment, result in state checks or warrants—which can be an electronic transfer or a check—to the vendor of the goods or services. Vendors may be businesses, government entities, individuals or organizations.
The distribution of most state expenditures among the counties relies upon a computerized file with the name and mailing address of each vendor. Designed to track accounting transactions, USAS does not identify the location of expenditures. A vendor’s address may not accurately indicate where the purchased goods or services were delivered.
The Comptroller’s office makes adjustments to the underlying USAS data for large expenditure categories that, if not reallocated, would misrepresent the distribution of state funds to counties. With USAS, certain major expenditures, such as state employee benefit payments or public assistance may appear to be made only in Travis County, since it is the headquarters for most state agencies. In this report, these payments, including expenditures for insurance, retirement contributions and social security, are adjusted.
The Comptroller’s office reallocates unemployment compensation benefits to former state employees and insurance payments for current employees based on a percentage of state employees in each county. Employee retirement and social security payments are allocated by a ratio of state employee salaries by county and by agency using USAS data. State contributions to the Teacher Retirement System are allocated to counties based on where payments to retirees from the trust fund were made.
Each year, the Comptroller’s office uses information from selected state agencies to make adjustments to the data for this report. For fiscal 2006, the Texas Education Agency provided expenditure data on textbooks for public schools. The Texas Department of Transportation provided information on highway construction, maintenance and right-of-way to more accurately allocate expenditures to the county in which the construction was performed. The Department of State Health Services’ payments for the Special Supplemental Food Program for Women, Infants and Children were adjusted using a statewide distribution of the program’s client population. The Comptroller’s office used data from the Health and Human Services Commission (HHSC), for Medicaid clients by county, to adjust fee-for-service and managed care Medicaid expenditures. Payment data by county for Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) was provided by HHSC to make a proportional distribution by county. The Department of Criminal Justice provided a list of vendors for each state-operated facility with amounts paid to out-of-state vendors. The Attorney General’s office supplied a list of the agency’s distribution of child support payments made to recipients in and out of the state. The Department of Aging and Disability Services provided data by county for payments made for long term care nursing facilities and hospice care; Title XX Long Term Care/Non-Medicaid Services; and Intermediate Care Facilities/Mental Retardation. The Texas Workforce Commission provided unemployment insurance benefit data by county, and the Veterans’ Land Board supplied a file of expenditures made to counties for housing assistance and home improvement programs.
Expenditures not allocated to counties are moved to “Expenditures Unallocable to Texas Counties.” Transactions moved to this category in fiscal 2006 include expenditures for Object Codes 7001-7043 and 7050, Salaries and Wages; Object Code 7662, Vendor Drug Program; Object Code 7664, Supplementary Medical Benefits; a portion of transactions for Object Code 7666, Medical Services and Specialties; and Object Code 7801, Interest on Governmental and Fiduciary Long Term Debt. Also listed under this category were transactions under Object Code 7253, Other Professional Services; Object Code 7830, Disbursement of Disproportionate Share Funds to State Hospitals; and Object Code 7832, State Hospital Payments of State Matching Disproportionate Share Funds to the Texas Department of Health.
In some cases, smaller objects of expenditure that have not been redistributed may be reflected in the county where payment was made, not in the county where the goods or services were delivered.