Yamhill County Commissioners will seal the deal Monday on an $84.3 million budget for the fiscal year that begins two days later. The board will meet at 1 p.m. in Room 32 of the Yamhill County Courthouse.

The budget is slightly higher than this year, but that obscures the fact that several departments and programs have been, or will be, affected by layoffs. The Community Corrections Department is taking the biggest hit, with half a dozen full-time positions either eliminated or unfilled - a jail clerk, corrections officer, a probation officer, a work crew supervisor, and several aides.

To a greater extent than is normal, the county officials have had to wait until the eleventh hour for solid information about some revenue sources, because they are controlled by the Oregon Legislature, still in session.

"We've been dealing with the changes to the budget as late as 4:30 yesterday afternoon," Chief Budget Officer John Krawczyk told commissioners Wednesday morning.

For the corrections department, which gets state money in the hundreds of thousands of dollars, that's meant a rollercoaster ride for employees there.

"It's been a whirlwind for us," said corrections department staffer Barbara Paladini. "We've just taken one hit after another."

Some of the damage has already been absorbed because some cuts were made to the current state budget, which is biennial.

Krawczyk warned that next year may be worse, because there's a lag time between the county's assessment of property values - which have been falling - and tax collections.

"From everything I've seen, the housing market has not yet bottomed out," he said. "We're anticipating this is going to continue."

It was for that reason that officials spent considerable time Wednesday talking about the fate of a single position - the receptionist in the District Attorney's office. A funding shortfall there raised the prospect that the position might be cut.

District Attorney Brad Berry said the person in that job deals with literally thousands of customers a month, and that with her gone, the work would be distributed among his staff.

"I don't know how we'll do it," he said. "If we end up taking the cut, obviously we will find a way."

Some, including Commissioner Leslie Lewis, argued that given the prospects of a financially uncertain future, it was prudent to make the cut now rather than put it off, but Commissioners Mary Stern and Kathy George agreed to dip into the county's share of federal forest receipts to salvage the spot.

"I just don't feel right about cutting this position when we have the money," Stern said.

It wasn't all bad news. One of the last-minute changes to the budget was the addition of $1.1 million in state funds that will be used for three capital construction projects in the courthouse, some of which address court security issues.