Como’s problems have been compounded.

That’s nothing new. The town has been struggling, noticeably since the summer of 2007 when the municipal bank funds were frozen by the Internal Revenue Service because funds withheld from employees’ paychecks were not being deposited in trust.

That jolt was followed by a series of revelations of fiscal mismanagement that seemed to follow one after another every time the town board met for the remainder of 2007 and well into 2008. Estimates of the town’s arrears ranged from $400,000 to $700,000 or maybe $1 million. No one was ever quite sure. This in a town that adopted a $1.2 million annual budget for fiscal 2011.

Yet Como has managed to survive, even making a little headway. The dangerous fiscal condition which seemed to threaten Como’s very existence as a municipality so alarmed its citizenry that they mobilized to recover financially and to preserve the picturesque structures that help shape the town’s personality and unique signature.

It wasn’t always pretty, but after people occasionally got angry with each other they soon put differences aside to try to overcome the very real threat of insolvency.

And they’ve made progress. After almost three years the uphill struggle was beginning to level out.

Then in June came the payment demand from PERS — that’s the Public Employees Retirement System of Mississippi — for almost $40,000.

It was far more bizarre than any previous revelation of unexpected and unanticipated debt owed by the town. The $40,000 dated back to the mid-1980s when the town did not deduct retirement contributions from an employee who worked there for three years. Had the deductions been withheld from the employee’s paycheck each week, it would have triggered a matching contribution from the town.

However, the issue was moot until this year when the former employee began to plan his retirement and contacted PERS about his eligibility to draw from his three years of Como employment. He could, it turns out, if he paid in the amount that should have been deducted from his paycheck back in the 1980s plus penalties and interest.

Which he did, triggering PERS’ demand to Como for its portion — less than $5,000 for the original amount plus penalties and interest that bring the total to about $40,000.

Discussions at Como board meetings subsequent to June have been dominated by citizen indignation because the town clerk responsible for deducting the retirement from the employee’s paycheck was the wife of the employee. Various suggestions have arisen, which may or may not be pursued, about attempting to collect the amount from the former clerk’s bond.

Yet — and board attorney Trey Lamar has been clear about this — the town must pay the money to PERS, and PERS has told Como that it will collect from any state funds paid back to the town until the debt is satisfied. That’s sales tax reimbursement and other funds usually returned to the town each month.

If those amounts are withheld in their entirety each month (and we have tried in vain to learn from PERS how they will recoup the amount. Our inquiries have received no response) until PERS gets its $40,000, the whole scope of municipal services — police, fire, sewer, water will be threatened.

PERS’  action toward Como has been cavalier, arbitrary and without consideration of the serious impact created in a struggling town.

Como was doing better.

Como deserves better.