Tim Morley, longtime president of the Bethel Park Board of Trustees, has worked on the city’s budget every year dating back to the 1990s.
His final effort in this regard involves the difficult choices of increasing the real estate tax rate by 0.75 mills and increasing local taxes on earned income and net income by 0.1% for 2024.
“We spent a lot of time going over budget. Couldn’t we have cut back a little bit and cut back on services? Yeah, we probably could have done that,” Morley said, seeking a second term. He decided not to ask for the same, and spoke at the city council meeting on November 13th. “But we would have just mortgaged our future.”
While the council unanimously approved the tax increase, it also adopted a spending plan of $30.75 million for general operating expenses in 2024. This year’s budget lists a total of $29.83 million.
The new real estate tax rate is 3.53 mills, of which 0.34 mills will go to the Bethel Park Volunteer Fire Department. A property owner with a median value of $149,300 in Allegheny County’s listed municipalities would pay $527.03 in taxes, an increase of $111.98 from this year.
The earned income/net income tax will increase to 1.5%, with 0.5% going to the Bethel Park School District.
Dr. Timothy Campbell, another City Council member who did not run for re-election, explained some of the circumstances that led to the increase.
“Inflation has increased by double digits. This affects everything from paper clips to paper products to grass seeds to salt trucks to police vehicles. It affects the price of asphalt. It has a huge impact on things like utility bills, even things like drywall that we had to do,” Campbell said. “Also, a lot of his medical costs have increased by 9.75 (percent). And it’s really only in the last six months that it’s really become apparent.”
A new five-year contract with garbage and recycling collection company Waste Management, negotiated with multiple municipalities through the South Hills Regional Council of Governments, will increase Bethel Park’s costs by 56% in 2024, Campbell said. It means that.
“We cut every extra expense we could,” he said. “We froze and postponed a lot of capital projects that we wanted to do. We still have to plow and pave the roads. We still have to keep the street lights on. We still have parks. maintenance is required.”
On the revenue front, Bethel Park has the potential for significant declines due to the prime real estate it shares with neighboring Upper St. Clair.
“We have filed tax assessments with South Hills Village, one of the largest taxing agencies, and have been forced to repay approximately $230,000 over the past four years,” Morley said.
He discussed steps taken to reduce city costs.
“We’ve also lost some headcount. There’s been some reassignment of duties. So we’ve been looking from top to bottom to see where the efficiencies are and where we can effectively cut back.” He said. “But it is up to us to either significantly reduce our services or adjust our revenue accordingly.”
The 2023 real estate tax rates for Allegheny County municipalities adjacent to Bethel Park are: Baldwin Ward, 6.78 mills. Castle Shannon, 9.658; Mount Lebanon, 4.91; South Park Township, 3.062; Upper St. Clair, 3.83 mill. Whitehall, 4.4200.
Interest rates in nearby Washington County townships are 1.7 mills in Peters and 1.184 in Union.
Harry Funk is news editor at Tribune-Review. Harry can be reached at hfunk@triblive.com.