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� s � made at budget time. The School Board had the same experience at last night's budget hearing, but the people who spoke were mainly concerned about the family, the children, and the crisis in America. He felt the loss of 2 school resource officers would be devastating to the taxpayers who spoke last night. Dr. Norris noted that we are the only county out of 4 in this area that is without a children's resource council. He emphasized that the resource officer program is a preventive measure and urged the Board not to cut the number of resource officers from 5 to 3. Chairman Bird wondered if it would make more sense to have the resource officers under the School Board budget even though it comes out of the same taxpayer base. Dr. Norris explained that their budget is set by the State Legislature and the reductions made by the School Board last night were out of capital budgets. Robert Haas, 2254 5th Court SE, commended the Board for the cuts made after last week's meeting, but would like to see more consideration of the tax burden on residents of Indian River County. He noted that many residents have jobs where they make less than $7 an hour, which really makes it difficult to provide for their families and pay their property taxes. He suggested having a few public discussion sessions before going into the two final budget hearings in September to allow the public to make their feelings known to the Commission before the proposed budget is presented to the public. Fred Mensing of Roseland hoped that Sheriff Wheeler could find a way to have 2 resource officers at the schools for at least a few hours a day. He maintained it was time for the BCC to reform county government and take control of county government. He did not feel a county administrator was necessary when we have elected officials who are accountable. He suggested several areas where cuts could be made to further reduce the taxpayers' burden, such as having the BCC address the code enforcement issues and cutting the budget for the county engineering department. He questioned the need for all the fringe benefits paid county employees, and advocated using more volunteers in fire fighting and minor law enforcement. Mr. Mensing emphasized that the free ride from the taxpayers is over. Victor Hart, president of the local branch of the NAACP, commended the Board for working with the constitutional officers to reduce the budget. He also wished to commend Sheriff Wheeler for 13 BOOK 90 PAUF 560 SEP �.5199e ,..: ,