While we may be in the midst of the 2026 Legislative Session, it’s time to begin our agency budget development process for the 2027-2029 Biennium. Conservation district needs figure prominently into our budget, and it’s important we have a thoughtful, structured process to gather information and priorities from conservation districts as we create our budget.

We received positive feedback from our conservation district partners about the way we engaged them during this most recent budget development process. Building on this success, we have developed a new process for creating our agency budget. This new process will more directly impact our program managers but is something we will be standardizing and embracing across SCC. This work will begin with an all-CD meeting on February 9th to discuss their funding priorities. The Policy team and Regional Managers will be there to collect feedback and inform next steps. Program staff are encouraged to attend virtually.

Rather than having each program manager responsible for developing their program budget, writing a decision package, and engaging with conservation districts, SCC as a whole will be providing more direct administrative support to coordinate efforts across programs. Policy staff are working directly with the program team on the process to develop DPs and the role of program managers.  

This coordination across the agency will help streamline our engagement with conservation districts, something we’ve heard as a priority. It will allow us to ensure our budget is in alignment with our agency goals, conservation needs, and reflective of nuanced political realities. Guidance on our new process can be found on our Policy & Legislative Affairs Intranet page.

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