NORWICH – Before Chenango County Treasurer William Evans retires, as was announced earlier in June, the county supervisors who sit on the Public Works Committee have a job left for him to do: Budget employee benefits per government department, not in one lump sum.

That lump sum amounts to about $8 million for this year, the majority of which goes for employee hospitalizations and pensions. Some departments, such as social services and mental hygiene services, already report contractual expenses related to fringe benefits, but not all.

“Why don’t we have them (listed) in every department?” asked Chenango County Supervisor Peter C. Flanagan, D-Preston, during the committee’s June meeting. “It’s hard to tell all of the costs associated with these departments when making budgeting decisions.”

For 15 years, the supervisor from Preston said he has requested benefit details outlined per department. He came close to getting some answers in late 2008 when Evans said he would convene a work session the following year to inform committees of the amounts per department. Even though Flanagan has said supervisors don’t need to see individual prescription costs, Evans insisted that providing the information in open session would be prohibited by federal privacy laws.

Whether or not county supervisors learned the benefit tallies per department within executive sessions held last year is unknown.

In particular, Flanagan has pushed for the details within the highway, landfill and recycling operations budgets because he said an original stipulation for beginning the business of recycling in the county was contingent upon having the department paid for by users, not by all taxpayers. Recycling revenues typically exceed projections at year’s end and surplus is used, in part, to afford bond payments for the Chenango County Public Safety Facility.

Flanagan said he looked forward to 2012 when the last bond is paid off and the amount can be kept within the recycling budget and used to afford personnel and fringe.

He has also pointed out, more recently, that retirement benefits paid to the 64 corrections officers employed at the county jail are some of the highest amounts in the county. When the number of inmates began declining last year and continued into this year, Flanagan suggested letting some officers go in order to save future retirement expenses. (A previously vacated pod at the jail was recently opened to meet an increasing inmate population.)

“They are going to have a 20 to 25 year package when they retire. They will take the bulk of the county’s payout,” he said, referring to the officers. Evans has confirmed that pension payouts in Corrections had increased about 14 to 15 percent since the jail was built and fully staffed three years ago.

This year, Flanagan has the support of the committee’s new chairman, Supervisor Linda E. Natoli, R-City of Norwich, who replaced longtime chairman Harry Conley of Sherburne, who retired. Conley voted against his own committee’s resolutions on more than one occasion.