Chartiers residents faced with library tax referendum
The future of Chartiers-Houston Community Library hangs in the balance with Tuesday’s election.
Chartiers-Houston School District eliminated a $50,000 annual allocation for the library in its 2014-15 budget year, which began July 1, so the library’s board of directors, with just a few months’ notice, was forced to make up the difference from other sources and cut its hours of operation to 51 per week, down from its previous 56 hours.
Chartiers Township Board of Supervisors was met with a request for additional funding. The school district and township operate on different fiscal years, so the township supervisors, who already had earmarked $20,000 for the library this calendar year, had few alternatives except to ask its taxpayers if they are willing to impose a tax on themselves to benefit and maintain the library.
In the meantime, the library has appealed to residents through direct mail, the Washington County Community Foundation’s “Day of Giving” online campaign and a spaghetti dinner at Houston American Legion Post. Were it not for donations, the library would have been forced to close last month.
The five-member library board was divided on whether to go through with the referendum proposed by the township supervisors, with three in favor and two opposed.
Bill Hill, 72, president of the library’s board of directors and Chartiers Township’s representative on the library board, supports a “yes” vote on the referendum.
If the referendum passes, it would enable the library to seek a library director and have that person in place by Jan. 1, “and be in a position of stability from year to year and allow us to run a library and not be begging for money all year,” said Hill, who often spends 6 1/2-hour days volunteering there.
Jodi Noble, Chartiers Township manager, said if voters approve the referendum question, the owner of a home with a market value of $100,000 would be paying about $50 more per year in taxes beginning in 2015.
Tax millage in Chartiers is now 9.
One mill generates $56,000 for the township, so two mills would provide $112,000 for the library, Noble said.
Washington County levies 24.9 mills, and the Chartiers-Houston School District rate, according to the township website, is 119.5125.
Chartiers Township had 7,818 residents according to the 2010 U.S. Census, with more than 3,000 households, and Houston Borough had 1,296 residents and about 600 households.
The referendum is not appearing on the ballots of Houston residents because no one asked for one. Hill said if Chartiers residents pass Tuesday’s measure, Houstonians would then be asked to consider a similar question in a future election.
Demo Agoris, 73, of Houston, vice president of the Chartiers-Houston Community Library Board of Directors, said he tried unsuccessfully in September to persuade Chartiers Township supervisors to remove the referendum from Tuesday’s ballot, and, in a letter to the editor submitted to the Observer-Reporter, he urged his neighbors in Chartiers Township to vote “no” for the two-mill tax increase to be used to benefit and maintain the community library, which received $35,000 in state funding this year.
Agoris, who has run for Congress and various local offices under the Libertarian Party banner, said Friday, “I’m against any library tax.” Although Pennsylvania mandates that a library must pay employees a certain number of hours per month to receive state funding, Agoris thinks volunteers should staff the library the rest of the time, and the library should apply for grants. He’d also like to an accountant to volunteer to handle bookkeeping duties.
He said he is spending more than 10 hours a week working on the library computer system. He hopes to increase the number of computers at the library to 15 from seven. Agoris said he also substituted for paid staffers for three hours this month.
Agoris said the success of recent fundraising efforts has been keeping the library afloat without the need for a designated tax.