NORRISTOWN >> Montgomery county taxpayers will see an increase in their tax bills next year, as commissioners voted unanimously Thursday to approve a proposed budget that would raise county property taxes by 9.8 percent.
The $389.7 million budget would increase the county millage to 3.459. For a house assessed at the county average of $168,901, the increase would amount to $51.86 per year. The Montgomery County tax bill for a house assessed at that amount would increase from $532.38 per year to $584.24.
County CFO Uri Monson pointed out that the 2016 budget was $30 million less than the county’s 2012 operating budget. “We always said we would spend what was necessary and no more to meet the needs of the people of Montgomery County,” Commissioner Josh Shapiro said. “Spending levels are down in Montgomery County. Yet it is far more targeted than ever before, and is putting us in a position to make the investments that are critically necessary to meet the ongoing operations of the government.”
Slight changes from the projected budget would reduce that projected surplus from $55,000 to $31,000, but revenue remained the same.
“It is a structurally balanced budget. We had several years of annual operating surpluses and this is projected to continue that trend,” Monson said.
The increased revenue would go to cover approximately $10 million in new expenses the county will face this year – new costs include increased debt service payments, an increase in the prison healthcare contract, arbitration for corrections officers, interest, inflation and departmental increases. New debt for roads, bridges and other infrastructure projects is also included in the $10 million.
The tax increase, however, in addition to the increase in real estate valuation in the county, would generate approximately $18 million in new revenue.
The increase would also go to fund new measures, such as full payments to the pension fund, more staffing for county parks and security, a 1.5 percent salary increase for unrepresented county employees and more programs and maintenance for the parks and trails system.
The additional revenue would also help maintain the reserve fund, provide funds to match and leverage additional state funding for children and youth programs and help the county improve adult probation, public transportation initiatives and implementation of strategies derived from county data, Monson said.
The commissioners voted Nov. 20 to post the budget for public review.
“Another principal that this administration has been guided by is transparency in this process,” Commissioner Val Arkoosh said.
Following the Dec. 3 meeting of the board, the commissioners held a public hearing, with a second hearing at 4 p.m. that day, to receive public input on the budget. They received none, except for a representative from Montgomery County Community College thanking commissioners for the funding.
On Thursday, commissioners also approved four non-general fund budgets: $112,084,000 for the Health Choices Fund; $1,550,000 for the Self Insurance Fund; $15,823,544 for the Emergency Dispatch Services Fund; and $1,447,244 for the Liquid Fuel Tax Fund.
Finally, a capital budget of $76,206,615 was approved by the commissioners. Of that budget, $49,380,511 comes from county funds. About one-third of that budget is being used for roads and bridges, while other top line items are parks and trails, public safety and corrections and information technology.
“This is a great step for this proposal in continuing to deal with, in particular, the 62 structurally deficient bridges that this administration inherited four years ago,” Arkoosh said. “We are slowly and steadily making progress on this. We are around the two-thirds mark in terms of bridges that are under repair, have been repaired or are in design.”
