Sugarcreek Borough administrator Joseph Sporer told council members Wednesday that a budget has been crafted without a tax increase for the fifth straight year in the borough.
Sporer said that while the pandemic did negatively affect the borough’s sources of revenue in the beginning, that impact “appears to have leveled off.”
The unexpected on-time payments of a significant proportion of borough real estate taxes have done its part to offset the impact, Sporer said. And, he added, with a “slight increase” in the municipality’s earned income tax and other indicators, it seems that “more of the borough’s residents are working this year.”
While the board thanked Sporer for the hard work he has put into the 2022 budget, he said the work was made easy because “every person that works in this building has done a tremendous job at maintaining their departments’ expenses.”
“Everybody here does their jobs,” said Sporer. “When everyone does their jobs that makes our job on the budget that much easier.”
In other business Wednesday, the council approved the purchase of a grader, which was discussed at the August meeting, as well as a new mower.
The cost of the grader, said borough maintenance foreman Doug Freer, has gone up to $5,000 in the two months since the original quote.
The borough‘s current grader is 30 years old and anticipated to sell for around $20,000-$40,000, Sporer said.
The mower will replace the borough‘s current mower, which is 16 years old. Its price, Freer said, is $12,836. The retail price is around $16,000, Sporer said.
Money for both equipment purchases will come from the borough’s liquid fuels and reserve accounts.
Sporer told the council that equipment at the Front Street playground would be coming out in the next four to six weeks, and he’d have a paper layout of the anticipated new playground equipment, the price of which is still being negotiated, at council’s Nov. 3 meeting.
