Oct 26, 2018 2 min read

North Strabane Township supervisors on Tuesday approved a preliminary 2019 budget of $14.2 million, slightly above this year’s $13.6 million.

The difference of $619,367 won’t require any tax increases, according to township manager Andy Walz.

The township’s general fund makes up more than half the budget at $7.6 million, up from this year’s $7.4 million. That increase, Walz said, is mostly due to salary increases.

“Historically, it’s less of an increase than previous years,” he said. “We try to be very conservative with that.”

The township’s police department makes up 49 percent of the general fund expenses, and increased by $146,051 from 2018.

“That increase is largely due to contractually obligated salary increases,” Walz said.

The next largest revenue source for the township is the capital fund, which is tax money received from the casino. The 2019 capital fund is estimated to be just over $3 million.

Walz said that although the township is fronting costs for damage done by multiple landslides in the Majestic Hills development, the township isn’t planning to set aside money in its budget to cover them. Instead, it plans to pay the costs with bond money, then seek compensation through legal action.

During Tuesday’s meeting, the supervisors approved a $16 million bond to pay for its building project, which will include rebuilding the Route 19 fire station, building a new fire sub-station in Eighty Four and rebuilding the township’s municipal building on Route 519.

Walz said some of the bond money could be used initially to pay for construction of a wall to stabilize Oakwood Drive, which was damaged in a recent slide in Majestic Hills, along with other costs associated with the slides in the development.

“The goal is for any of those expenditures to be recouped through some sort of legal process,” he said.