Soaring fuel prices have Johnson County and Cleburne officials frustrated and searching for answers.

County and city budgets required adjustments during the current fiscal year to cover rising fuel costs. Both entities plan to budget substantial fuel budget increases for the 2008-09 fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1, officials said.

“We’re at the mercy of the markets,” said Johnson County Judge Roger Harmon said. “We don’t know if [fuel prices] will continue to fall or go back up. If T. Boone Pickens is correct, gas is going to be $6 or $7 a gallon in three to four years.”

Commissioner R.C. McFall agreed.

“No one knows; the experts don’t know,” McFall said. “This thing’s so volatile. I just got back from New Mexico where I paid $4.19 a gallon. This morning it was $3.69 in Granbury.”

McFall said he amended his fuel budget this year for the first time since he became commissioner. In previous years, he said he remained within budget with a small amount of funds left at year’s end.

“In last year’s budget talks, I budgeted my office, Precinct 1, for $3.50 a gallon, and the other commissioners kidded me and thought I was crazy,” McFall said. “I wound up having to do a $19,000 amendment to the budget to get through the rest of the year. I budgeted $4 a gallon this year to be on the safe side.”

Commissioners Mark Carpenter and Don Beeson also increased their fuel budgets by amendment this year.

Precinct 1 required a 27 percent increase, Precinct 3 a 45 percent increase and Precinct 4 a 57 percent increase, said Holly Morris, Johnson County budget coordinator.

“Who knows where it’s going to go?” Carpenter said. “Diesel was 97 cents a gallon when I first came into office in 1997, now it’s more than four times that.”

The recent price volatility of fuel makes budget planning extremely difficult for both citizens and governmental entities, Beeson said.

“That’s right, nobody really has a clue right now,” Beeson said. “We just have to take previous year’s information then make our best educated, or maybe uneducated, guess. It’s frustrating.

“I think, I’m not sure if it will though, that we probably won’t see much stabilization until after the general election in November. We have two candidates with very different philosophies on energy policy. I think the markets are also waiting until after the election.”

Johnson County department heads generally consider gallons of fuel consumed over the last three years and compare that with the current and expected price of gas over the coming year to arrive at a budget estimate for the next fiscal year, Harmon and McFall said.

Precinct 2 Commissioner John Matthews has about $15,000 remaining and said he probably will not need to budget an increase.

“It’s been tough,” Matthews said. “But I’m not a proponent of line-item increases, so we’ve scaled back to try to remain within budget. We’ve done about 30 miles of road repair and construction instead of the 45 we planned on.”

Road maintenance cutbacks appear to be the wave of the immediate future.

“We’ll probably do less reclaiming of roads this coming year and more filling pot holes and other repairs, at least until things stabilize,” Beeson said.

More problematic than fuel costs, county officials said, is the multiplier effect of increased fuel prices.

“What hurts more are increases in all the products we use tied to fuel,” Beeson said.

The cost of enough liquid asphalt to pave two miles of road increased from $7,000 to $16,000 this year, McFall said, and that doesn’t include other materials or labor.

Sheriff Bob Alford budgeted for $3 a gallon last year and said he’s fortunate his department had some money to move from other areas to make up the needed difference. Alford said he budgeted for $5 a gallon this year.

“And, we could well be short at that,” Alford said. “I try to budget it as conservatively as possible but still have enough of a range we can live and operate within.”

Fuel budgets requests for the precincts for the coming fiscal year increased significantly. Precinct 2 requested a 30 percent increase over the current year’s budget, Precinct 3 a 45 percent increase and Precinct 4 a 40 percent increase. Precinct 1 requests have not yet been received, Morris said.

Commissioners have instructed county employees not to use vehicles more than necessary and not to allow them to run and idle if possible. They also said they look for the cleanest running, most efficient vehicles when seeking replacements.

Cleburne officials said their city has experienced the same challenges. The city budgeted $411,528 for fuel costs this year but will finish the fiscal year having spent about $499,209, said Kim Galvin, Cleburne budget and purchasing manager. The city will probably increase the fuel budget about 75 percent to $822,000 for the coming year, Galvin said.

Nonetheless, fuel funding only represents about 1.3 percent of Cleburne’s budget, Galvin said.

“Although it’s a small percentage of our budget, we still face other rising costs from supplies and materials made with [petroleum products]. Then there’s increased delivery charges vendors pass on.”

Cleburne also has a fuel conservation and anti-idle policy for city vehicles, said Assistant City Manager Adam Miles. They also closely scrutinize new vehicle purchases, he said.

“Fuel costs aren’t easy to budget for or deal with,” Miles said. “We face the same thing we all face at home with our finances.”

Hybrid vehicles are not yet a realistic option, Miles said, although they were considered. The high cost of the vehicles offsets most of the fuel savings, and most city vehicles are heavy, not light duty, use.

“Can’t really use a Prius to pick up garbage or carry road repair equipment,” Miles said.

Changes have been made. Fire trucks, which used to fuel up at a central location, now use gas stations around town.

“The big trucks get about eight miles a gallon,” said Cleburne Fire Chief Clint Ishmael. “So it wastes gas to drive to the fleet center for two of the stations. Using other locations also leaves the trucks in their district.”

The news is not all bad. Despite uncertain fuel prices, the city will probably lower property tax rates, as they’ve done in recent years, for the coming budget year, said City Manager Chester Nolen said.

Commissioners hope to lower their tax rate as well, McFall said.