Our survey of local governments' long-term debt, which has already covered the City of Portland and the Portland School District, today turns to Multnomah County. The county goes to the Wall Street well every year to issue "tax and revenue anticipation notes," whereby it borrows money against upcoming tax collections. The notes are short-term -- repayable in about a year. When they borrow the dough, county officials have to disclose the government's finances in an official statement, and this year's is here.

From that document, we gather that the county has $336,913,160 in long-term debt outstanding, including $170,908,160 of pension bonds, which are used to pay county employees' retirement benefits through the state PERS system. In addition, the county estimates that it's got $44.7 million in obligations outstanding for health insurance benefits for retirees. The grand total comes to $381,613,160. With a population of 701,545, that comes to $543.96 per resident -- less than half the $1,211.84 per capita debt owed by the school district and truly chump change compared to the $7,516.02 per resident racked up by the City of Portland.

But if you're keeping score at home, with the city, school district, and county aggregated, we're up to $9,271.82 of long-term debt per head, or more than $37,000 for a family of four.

For the record, here's the debt clock for the county: