Leechburg Area School Board decides against lawsuit against Westmoreland County

The Leechburg Area School Board will not be following through with a promised lawsuit against Westmoreland County after being presented with a possible solution to tax rate issues by Westmoreland County assessors.

“The board is still considering all of its legal options,” said Ashley Coudriet, school board president. “Currently, Westmoreland County has provided additional information that the district is now discussing with the Pennsylvania Department of Education that may solve the taxation issue without the need for litigation.”

A lawsuit was discussed at a July town hall meeting hosted by school board members to discuss ongoing tax rate issues. The school board says the county has not conducted timely reassessments of properties.

“It’s a cost to our taxpayers to have any type of litigation, so it’s not a fun thing,” Keibler said. “There’s really not a great return on that investment unless you gain something out of it. I’m just thankful for the commissioners and the chief assessor who reached out and are working with us so that we didn’t have to spend money in litigation.”

During the town hall, Leechburg Area Superintendent David Keibler said the lawsuit would be voted on at Wednesday’s meeting.

However, after Keibler and a group of West Leechburg residents attended the Westmoreland County commissioners meeting Aug. 1, legal intervention will no longer be happening.

Keibler, who joined the lobbying effort with local residents, said continued discussions with county leaders identified other potential solutions short of a countywide reassessment that could ease tax inequities among the district’s municipalities.

Camdon Porterfield, the county’s chief assessor, previously told TribLive the issue may be in the district’s calculations because other districts that cross counties, such as Belle Vernon and Norwin, don’t have the same problems.

But, Keilber said, “We did not have any internal calculation errors that we discovered through that.”

He said the chief assessor reached out and met over Zoom with district officials. After sharing data and looking at common properties between the two counties in the Leechburg Area School District — Westmoreland and Armstrong — Keibler said the assessors were able to “run some new numbers and formulate what they think would be able to better represent the two counties.”

“They were able to come up with a formula that uses an exact number no matter which side of the river you’re on. No matter which county, you get the same taxation on the same property assessment,” Keibler said.

He said Porterfield reached out to the State Tax Equalization Board (STEB) to present the proposed solution and was directed to speak with the Pennsylvania Department of Education.

“Our next step would be gathering a little more information and reaching out to get a meeting with (the state Education Department) to look internally,” Keibler said.

The initial plan to file a lawsuit against the county was met with approval from West Leechburg residents whose property taxes were raised by 10.4% when the school board passed the 2024-25 budget. The massive hike was due to an equalization formula provided by STEB, which was created to compensate for the lack of assessment uniformity among counties.

School districts that cross county lines are required to use the formula because it attempts to raise or lower millage rates to balance the dollar amount residents living in different counties pay in taxes to their school districts.

The numbers are based on the property values from the most recent reassessment and sales in the county each fiscal year. The last time Westmoreland County properties were reassessed was in 1973, and Armstrong County was last reassessed in 1997.

These value differences resulted in a $655 difference in tax bills for similar properties in Westmoreland and Armstrong.

Keibler said board members will continue to post updates about the taxing situation for residents on the district website.

The new formula is one of various solutions the board has explored, in addition to the threat of a lawsuit. Members considered appealing sales in Leechburg and Gilpin to balance the formula; hiring the district’s previous business manager, Brad Walker, to teach district officials about the appeal process and speak to members of the STEB board; and attempting to offer a tax rebate for West Leechburg residents.