Centre County Commissioners Adopt Final 2023 Budget with No Tax Increase

Centre County’s Board of Commissioners on Tuesday officially adopted a final 2023 county budget that includes no real estate tax increase for the 13th consecutive year.

The $106,869,156 budget was unchanged from the tentative budget approved by the commissioners on Dec. 6, and the county received no comments or questions during the 20-day public review period, County Administrator John Franek, Jr. said.

Commissioner Mark Higgins called the budget “disciplined,” noting an increase in expenditures of just 0.4% over 2022.

The budget includes operating expenses of $106,726,725 and capital spending of $142,431. With no increase in the real estate tax rate, the total millage remains 7.84 — with general millage of 6.65 mills and debt service of 1.19 mills.

The largest increase on the expenditures side is an 8.7% bump in employee salary and benefits resulting from the completion of salary and compensation study in 2022 and anticipated step and scale adjustments in 2023. Salary and benefits total $42.3 million in the tentative budget.

Increases in salaries and benefits, as well as debt service and depreciation are offset by decreases in contracted services and unrestricted grants, Corey Troutman, of Susquehanna Accounting and Consulting Solutions, said during an overview presented at the Dec. 6 board meeting..

Revenues match expenditures, marking a 0.3% increase.

federal and state grants and payments in lieu of taxes, which are the county’s largest source of income at 53% of the budget, see an expected decrease of approximately $4 million for 2023, but that it is balanced out by increases in departmental earnings and internal charges for services, Troutman said.

He added that the budget includes use of some American Rescue Plan Act funds to maintain current funding levels for county services.

The budget maintains a general fund reserve at 12.06%, which Higgins said earlier this month equals several months of operations and is at the high end for a county. Higgins added that the last three years the county forecasted budget deficits of about $2 million but that once the books were closed at the end of the year it had a small surplus.

Commissioner Steve Dershem credited county administrators, staff and Susquehanna Accounting for pulling together for a budget that kept taxes flat while maintaining. a high level of services.

“… Everybody in this room, we have a lot to be proud of that we got this done and as Mark indicated it was a pretty conservative budget,” Dershem said. “I’ll be happy to support it and let you know that hopefully we make it to 14 years without a tax increase.”

Board Chair Michael Pipe said some choices had to be made about what requests could be funded, but that the county is in sound financial shape and may revisit some of those requests throughout 2023.

“We know we weren’t able to say yes to everything,” Pipe said. “There were many times where we had to make decisions that requests that came in from department heads or elected officials even in our own office we needed to restrain. But throughout the year we’re committed to reexamining them, looking at those again. If there’s opportunities to revisit, certainly without a doubt we can do that. But again we needed to be very mindful about the position we were in. We’re in a good place.”

2023 Centre County Budget