Butler County government has continued to record multimillion-dollar end-of-year fund balances, thanks to unspent money accumulated over the past decade combined with tax increases and ongoing growth, especially in the county's southern sector. The money in question has allowed the county commissioners to avoid significant cost-cutting decisions.

But with the serious financial uncertainties tied to construction of a new prison still looming, possibly to the tune of $10 million over-budget, the commissioners and various department heads within the county's bureaucracy owe the taxpayers a genuine effort to cut costs for 2006 and beyond. Despite the future's troubling prospects, serious cost-cutting discussion has remained taboo within the sight of the public.

It's time for that to change.

The commissioners only have to look about 125 miles to the southeast to see how others are coping with money uncertainties and documented shortages. Rural Bedford County, which is not experiencing the fast growth enjoyed by Butler County, last month eliminated the assistant public defender and two other workers in a budget-tightening move. They also slashed the hours of part-time sheriff's deputies and curtailed $50,000 in capital expenses.

Like Bedford County, the Butler County commissioners have curtailed new hirings temporarily. But this county also must examine every iota of its day-to-day operations and effect measurable savings to lessen the blow on taxpayers that the prison project portends. There has been no evidence of such determination up to now. Thus, only top county officials are privy to how that prolonged form of inaction might impact property owners for the year ahead.

In Bedford County, officials' decision to let go an employee of the Prothonotary and Clerk of Courts' office due to the budget crunch prompted Prothonotary and Clerk of Courts Cathy Fetter to seek approval - the approval was obtained - to use part of her salary toward the pay of an employee who was laid off on Aug. 26.

Out of Fetter's annual pay of $46,612, $250 will be deducted every two weeks to pay the employee's salary. The remainder of the employee's $8.03-an-hour pay will come from a judge delaying the hiring of a new law clerk.

All of that is not to suggest that Butler County officials should give up pay to which they are entitled to help fund county operations. Instead, reflecting on what others are willing to do to save money should be an incentive for officials here to quit avoiding tough money-saving decisions, despite not yet having their financial backs to the wall.

If a higher-than-anticipated project cost does come to pass, the additional cost, without savings, could leave the commissioners with no alternative but to significantly hike the tax millage rate.

The hike-taxes fiscal-"escape" attitude that has evolved here over the past half-decade can't be allowed to continue. The prison project has cemented the urgency for positive financial moves to be made.

Why there isn't real evidence that such a effort is under way is troubling.