Penn-Trafford district budget includes no tax increase

The proposed Penn-Trafford School District budget for the 2023-24 academic year includes no tax increase, but dips in to the fund balance to pay a $700,000 shortfall.

Taxes in the Allegheny County portion of the district will actually decrease, according to district officials.

The budget, tentatively adopted in May, will be up for a final vote at the June 12 school board meeting.

Revenues total $65.2 million and expenses total $65.9 million. The district is budgeting for a 3.75% increase in revenues and a 3.69% increase in expenditures over last year.

To comply with rebalancing requirements across the two counties that Penn-Trafford serves, the millage rate for the Allegheny County portion will decrease slightly from 14.01 to 13.91. The Westmoreland County portion will remain at 89.75 mills, according to Brett Lago, school business manager.

The district’s median assessed value for Westmoreland homeowners is $27,690, and is $84,350 for Allegheny.

One mill brings the district about $230,000 in Allegheny County and $300,000 in Westmoreland County.

Funding changes

The proposed budget does not add any new programs to the district, Lago said.

“All the increases basically revolve around salaries and benefits, like they do every other year, and increases in our tuition costs for cyber and charter schools,” Lago said.

A 10% increase in health care costs, as well as increases in special education, security, transportation, technical school tuition and maintenance expenses also factored into the budget.

The district is in the process of soliciting bids for a new security camera system for all of its schools, which is projected to cost around $500,000. The district will have more details about the total price of the cameras by the end of June, he said.

The district also plans to continue working with Innersight, a mental health assistance company that the district first used during the pandemic. Penn-Trafford will use district funds for the program instead of covid funds, Lago said.

Innersight’s Bridges program facilitates anxiety support groups as well as some additional individual therapy hours, taking some of the workload off the district’s counselors. Previously, members of the district’s Student Assistance Program had raised concerns that Bridges would not be funded when pandemic-related funding ended.

“We’re going to make it up with district funds,” Lago said, noting that the $90,000 expense for a full-time staff person through the program, along with $88 dollars an hour for any additional extras, folds into the proposed budget.