Union County Budget & Contracts

Union County's adopted budget has grown roughly 89% since FY 2018-19, from about $37 million to roughly $70 million. Vendor-level disbursements are not disclosed in the approved budgets -- so what the public can see, and what it cannot, are two very different records.

Citation-backed8 fiscal years (FY 2018-19 to FY 2025-26)3 documented contracts

Union County official budget page county-budgets-7yr.md

Budget growth -- eight fiscal years

From FY 2018-19 to FY 2025-26, the county's adopted budget nearly doubled, while the permanent property-tax rate of $2.9668 per $1,000 assessed value has been unchanged for all eight years. The voter- approved local-option Weed Control levy of $0.12 per $1,000 has also run continuously (renewed by voters on May 18, 2021).

Fiscal year	Total adopted	General fund	Est. property tax revenue	Permanent rate	Commissioners	Budget officer	Source
FY 2025-26	$70,300,000 La Grande Observer (June 28, 2025) reports $70.3M adopted; Annual Wage Report cites $70,518,135 adopted June 25, 2025 by 3-0 vote. Adopted June 25, 2025.	$17,749,882	~$7.3M (estimated)	$2.9668	Paul Anderes, R. Matthew Scarfo, Jake Seavert	Shelley Burgess	county-budgets-7yr.md + commissioner-salaries-and-more.md
FY 2024-25	$64,490,726 Adopted June 26, 2024 (Resolution 2024-08).	$17,869,819	$7,035,000	$2.9668	Paul Anderes, Donna Beverage, R. Matthew Scarfo	Shelley Burgess	county-budgets-7yr.md
FY 2023-24	$61,446,464 Grand total revenues $61,446,464 per the adopted budget document (OCR extraction from the 132-page PDF).	$14,406,688	$6,645,000	$2.9668	Paul Anderes, Donna Beverage, R. Matthew Scarfo	Shelley Burgess	budget/Budget_FY2023-24.txt
FY 2022-23	$58,447,255 Total adopted budget $58,447,255 (Resolution adopted June 29, 2022). General fund total $13,155,120; narrative notes $13,123,849 general fund with property tax at 47% of revenues. OCR extraction from the 173-page scanned PDF.	$13,155,120	$6,190,300 (adopted) / $6,421,848 (actual)	$2.9668	Donna Beverage, Paul Anderes, R. Matthew Scarfo	Shelley Burgess	budget/Budget_FY2022-23.txt
FY 2021-22	$50,569,032 Adopted June 30, 2021 (Resolution 2021-12).	$13,515,515	$6,220,000	$2.9668	Donna Beverage, Paul Anderes, R. Matthew Scarfo (Chair)	Shelley Burgess	county-budgets-7yr.md
FY 2020-21	$47,851,644 Adopted June 24, 2020 (Resolution 2020-13).	$12,366,130	$5,983,000	$2.9668	Paul Anderes (Chair), Donna Beverage, R. Matthew Scarfo	Shelley Burgess	county-budgets-7yr.md
FY 2019-20	~$37,080,261 (total resources) PDF re-posted Feb 2025; not extracted in corpus run. Historical columns in FY2020-21 document supplied the figures shown.	~$12M (estimated)	$5,815,000	$2.9668	Paul Anderes, Donna Beverage, R. Matthew Scarfo	Shelley Burgess	county-budgets-7yr.md
FY 2018-19	~$37,132,096 (actual total resources) PDF not extracted in corpus run. Figures shown are actuals from historical columns in subsequent budgets.	~$11M (estimated)	$5,647,957 (actual)	$2.9668	Steve McClure, Jack Howard, Donna Beverage (per court/ecourt-search-log.md for the same 2017 board)	Shelley Burgess	county-budgets-7yr.md

All figures sourced from county-budgets-7yr.md and cross-referenced against the 2025 Annual Wage Report. PDFs for FY 2022-23 and FY 2019-20 were not fully text-extractable; figures shown for those years come from the comparison columns printed in neighboring years' approved budgets.

What the approved budget does NOT show

Oregon Local Budget Law (ORS Chapter 294) requires Oregon counties to publish category-level totals in their adopted budgets -- Personnel Services, Materials & Services, Capital Outlay, Debt Service, Contingencies, and so on -- broken down by fund and department. It does not require those documents to disclose who the county paid, line by line, at the vendor level.

Every one of Union County's approved budget PDFs from FY 2018-19 through FY 2025-26 follows that standard format. The documents contain aggregate category totals (for example, the FY 2024-25 budget shows Materials & Services of $21,945,029 across all funds) but no line items named "Legal Services," "County Counsel," "Outside Counsel," "Auditor," or "Professional Services" with a dollar figure attached to a specific vendor.

This is the normal format of an Oregon county budget. It is not, by itself, evidence of concealment. What it does mean is that a member of the public reading the approved budget PDF cannot see which vendors actually received the county's money, in what amounts, without filing a separate public- records request for the Treasurer's vendor warrant register or the Schedule of Expenditures from the Annual Financial Report.

That separate request is what this page is built to help the public file.

Known contracts -- what is in the corpus

Three Union County contracting relationships surface clearly in meeting minutes, court filings, and the 2025 Annual Wage Report. Two of them carry a public dollar amount. One does not.

Mike Becker Construction

General contractor (Oregon)

Disclosed: ~$3.63M
Period: FY 2024-25 through FY 2025-26
Scope: Airport Hangars A + B construction; Union County Fairgrounds water and wastewater system build-out.
Procure: Competitively bid. Airport hangars: lowest of 5 bids (ORS 279C public-improvement competitive bid).

Airport Hangars A + B: $1,132,810, awarded by Board motion on January 22, 2025, lowest of 5 bids received.
Fairgrounds water/wastewater: approximately $2.5 million, funded by HB 5006 and SB 5531 state appropriations; groundbreaking November 14, 2025.
Matt Scarfo chaired the roughly seven-year fairgrounds effort and has cited the project as his principal reason for seeking a third term.

Sources

meetings/2025-01-22-full-minutes.md players/matt-scarfo.md

Pinnacle Architecture

Architecture firm (Bend, OR)

Disclosed: $98,000 (not to exceed)
Period: FY 2024-25
Scope: Opioid-abatement facility feasibility study (site and program analysis for a facility funded through Oregon opioid settlement money).
Procure: Selected via Request for Proposals (RFP). First phase consumed approximately 51% of funds; supplemental services agreement authorized January 22, 2025.

Not-to-exceed contract value: $98,000 for the feasibility phase.
Supplemental services agreement authorized at the January 22, 2025 Board of Commissioners meeting.
Funded from Union County's Opioid Settlement Fund (budgeted at $490,000 in FY 2024-25).

Sources

meetings/2025-01-22-full-minutes.md

Baum Smith LLC / Wyatt Baum

Law firm (La Grande, OR); personal-services attorney contract

Disclosed: Not disclosed in public records
Period: At least 2024 through present
Scope: De facto Union County Counsel: legal advice to the Board of Commissioners, representation in Case 25CV22067 (the term-limits validation petition), and signature line as "attorney for petitioner" on the April 7, 2025 petition.
Procure: Personal-services attorney contracts are exempt from competitive bidding under ORS 279A.055 / ORS 279B.060. A long-term unrebid counsel relationship is legal under those statutes; the separate question is whether the public budget discloses what the county is paying.

Disclosure gap. Dollar amount is NOT disclosed in any public budget document, the 2025 Annual Wage Report, or any other county record located in the corpus. The relationship itself is documented -- the compensation is not. This is a factual gap in the public record, not an accusation.

Wyatt S. Baum (OSB #111773) signs the April 7, 2025 validation petition as "attorney for petitioner" for Union County in Case No. 25CV22067.
Appears in at least 2024-present Board of Commissioners minutes as "Legal Counsel" presenting agenda items (including the January 22, 2025 Term Limit Clarification).
Approved budget PDFs (FY 2018-19 through FY 2025-26) contain no line item for "Legal Services," "County Counsel," "Outside Counsel," or the Baum Smith firm by name.
The 2025 Annual Wage Report lists "County Counsel" among the positions covered by the 2026 salary ordinance (Ordinance No. 863-2025, per the Dec. 18, 2025 Board summary), but does not publish a specific dollar figure for that position.

Sources

public-records/commissioner-salaries-and-more.md court/lg-20332-notice-text.md meetings/2025-01-22-full-minutes.md

Presence on this page is not an accusation of wrongdoing. The Mike Becker Construction and Pinnacle Architecture entries describe contracts with public dollar figures and documented procurement processes. The Baum Smith LLC entry describes a documented relationship whose compensation is not published in the public budget -- a factual gap in the record, not a finding.

What would reveal vendor concentration

Three categories of public records, taken together, would let the public see which vendors are receiving county funds, in what amounts, across the eight years above. These are the records we are asking Union County to produce.

01
Union County Treasurer's vendor warrant / payment register
Full vendor warrant register or check register for FY 2018-19 through FY 2025-26. This is the document that shows who got paid, when, and how much -- payee, date, amount, and check or EFT number, line by line.
Agency: Union County Treasurer / Administrative Services
02
Union County Annual Financial Reports (AFRs)
Audited annual financial reports for FY 2018-19 through FY 2024-25, including the Schedule of Expenditures sections. AFRs are prepared after the fiscal year closes and are separate from the Approved Budget PDFs.
Agency: Union County Administrative Services
03
Baum Smith LLC county-counsel contract and invoices
The personal-services attorney contract (or engagement letter) between Union County and Baum Smith LLC / Wyatt Baum, any retainer agreement, and the full invoice and payment history for fiscal years 2020-21 through present.
Agency: Union County Administrative Services / County Counsel's office

Why some contracts are bid and others aren't

Oregon public contracting is governed by three ORS chapters. Each covers a different kind of contract and sets different rules for when competitive bidding is required.

ORS 279A -- Public contracting, general

Umbrella chapter defining public agencies, the Public Contracting Code, and general exemptions. ORS 279A.055 lists the categories of contracts that are not subject to the full competitive-bidding code -- including personal- services contracts for attorney and other professional services.

ORS 279B -- Goods and services

Contracts for goods or non-construction services. Small procurements under $10,000 can be direct award; intermediate procurements run roughly $10,000 to $150,000 and use simpler quote processes; contracts above $150,000 generally require competitive sealed bidding or an RFP. ORS 279B.060 preserves the personal-services attorney exemption from ORS 279A.055.

ORS 279C -- Public improvements (construction)

Construction and related public-improvement contracts. Generally requires competitive bidding for projects above roughly $5,000, with full bid-advertising procedures above $100,000. This is the chapter that governs the Mike Becker Construction airport-hangar contract -- awarded as the lowest of five bids on January 22, 2025.

The practical consequence: the airport-hangar contract (construction) must go out to public bid. The Baum Smith LLC counsel relationship (personal services, attorney) is exempt from competitive bidding by statute. Both results are legal. The disclosure question -- whether the public budget names the vendor and the dollar amount -- is a separate question from whether competitive bidding was required.

Context: county-funded legal work is already at the center of an active ethics case

On February 6, 2026, the Oregon Government Ethics Commission voted 7-0 to open preliminary review of OGEC Case 25-708ECF against Commissioner Matt Scarfo. One of the allegations presented by OGEC's Compliance Coordinator is that Scarfo used publicly funded county counsel to pursue a term-limits challenge that -- if it succeeded -- would directly benefit his own ability to run again. That underlying legal work was performed by Baum Smith LLC.

Read the OGEC case timeline

If you've seen a Union County check, we want to hear from you

If you've ever received a Union County check, processed a vendor warrant, or seen an invoice go out to a county vendor, you can help close the disclosure gap above. Names can stay off the record. The documents are what matter.

Request a record / share a document Support this work

Disclaimer. This page is a journalism resource. Every figure traces to a Union-County-published source (Approved Budget PDFs, the 2025 Annual Wage Report, Board of Commissioners minutes, or court filings in Case 25CV22067) indexed in the public corpus. Nothing here is legal advice, and nothing here alleges wrongdoing by any named person or firm. Corrections to: levi@valorinvestigates.com.

Full corpus: github.com/ValorInvestigator/union-county-term-limits