Silverdale Borough adopts budget, keeps tax rate steady for 50th year
There’s nothing in the Silverdale budget to celebrate a half century of having the same tax rate, but maybe there should be.
Nobody involved in the borough government today can even remember the last time the tax rate changed.
“I’ve lived here 28 years and they’ve never changed in that time,” Lisa eermann, borough secretary, said.
Silverdale Borough Council President Clair Black said, from what he’s heard, the last change was in 1963 — when the rate was reduced.
thile other towns calculate their budgets to the dollar, Sil- verdale does it to the penny. cor 2013, the budget numbers given final approval at council’s Dec. 17 meeting were $345,303.86 for the general fund, $127,802 for the sewer fund and $16,141.15 for the highway fund.
The property tax rate remains at 2.75 mills, equal to $82.50 on a home assessed at $30,000. Each mill equals $1 of tax per $1,000 of assessed property value. Along with not changing the tax rate for next year, sewer and trash collection bills will also remain the same, Black said.
Silverdale, which is surrounded by eilltown Township, contracts with that municipality for police coverage. The cost of that contract increases 5 percent for next year, bringing it to $81,407, eermann said.
Salaries of borough employees were frozen this year and again for next year, she said.
No major projects are planned in the borough next year, she said.
This year, an $80,000 project to upgrade playground equipment in the park is being paid for with $60,000 of county open space funding, $15,000 from the borough and $5,000 from the Silverdale oecreation Association, eermann said.
“Most of the new equipment is installed,” she said. “eopefully, they’ll be done by the end of the week is what we keep hearing.” In other Silverdale matters: • The owners of about 70 properties will soon be getting letters informing them the borough has included their property on a list of buildings that have architectural features worthy of being preserved.
The list follows in the footsteps of another preservation ordinance passed earlier this year.
“It’s an ordinance to prevent demolition of some structures in the community without some forethought and review,” council member Steve Cordell said.
The letters will also invite the property owners to a gan. 21 meeting with the council.
“It would be a special meeting with the residents whose names are on this to come in and voice their likes and dislikes,” Black said.
• The property owners with the three largest delinquent sewer bills — about $6,000 in one case and about $11,000 for the other two — are being sent letters notifying them they could lose their homes if the bills aren’t paid.
“thile it is harsh, it’s designed to be harsh to push people into paying the bills,” Colby drim, the borough’s solicitor, said.
“Some of these people haven’t paid bills since 2003,” eermann said.
Liens were previously placed on the properties and the property owners were given opportunities in the past to set up payment plans, but have not paid, she said.
If the bills are not paid, the money that is lost has to be made up by other sewer system users, drim said.
“I think you have to be fair to the other residents and come down on these people,” he said. “te’re starting the process. eopefully, they’re going to come in and pay.”