ESCANABA — The Delta County Board of Commissioners approved the county’s budget for its 2020-21 fiscal year during a meeting Tuesday.

The county’s 2020-21 general fund budget was listed as $10,890,281. This marked an increase of $37,153 from the amended 2019-20 general fund budget of $10,853,128.

Before the board voted, Delta County Administrator Emily DeSalvo gave a brief presentation.

“There’s a theme to this year, and it’s basically all things COVID,” she said, noting the county has had to spend money on personal protective equipment for employees and other expenses related to the pandemic.

While it was difficult to anticipate how COVID-19 will affect the coming fiscal year, DeSalvo said the county found a way to estimate revenues.

“What we did was take the average from that time period — the months of April through July — that we were hit the hardest in fiscal year (2019)-20 and average them out with prior years during that timeframe to come up with a forecast for revenues for fiscal year (2020)-21,” she said.

In response to COVID-19, the county’s budget for the 2020-21 fiscal year included $183,984 in cuts to discretionary spending and $321,899 in cuts to appropriations to other funds. However, the 2020-21 fiscal year’s budget does not include any layoffs or tax increases.

The board voted to approve a number of budget-related line items en masse after the presentation. These items allowed the budget to be approved with some minor amendments.