Oct 14, 2016 4 min read

It’s a task no one in Washington County government has had to grapple with in 35 years: Crafting a budget in the wake of a property reassessment.

The $89.8 million preliminary version of the 2017 spending plan is a work in progress with formal property assessment appeals scheduled through Oct. 31 and appeals to Common Pleas Court likely stretching into next year and perhaps beyond.

Another reason the 2017 budget is unusual is because a tax levy is nowhere to be found in the 94-page document prepared by the Finance Department, although the millage used to calculate property tax revenue is 2.49 mills. The 1981 assessment numbers are a thing of the past, and the county, under a $6.96 million contract with Tyler Technologies Inc., is using July 1, 2015, as its property valuation date. The county commissioners have until Nov. 15 to certify data that taxing bodies will use in setting new millage rates that, for the county and municipalities, will take effect Jan. 1, 2017. The next school district fiscal year will begin July 1, 2017.

Under the old property assessment, Washington County millage was 24.9.

Because a tax levy for municipalities and counties must be revenue-neutral for the tax year following a reassessment, elected officials must vote on a millage rate reflecting that for 2017 spending.

The county, officials have said, does not plan a tax increase for 2017. If a municipality plans to raise taxes for 2017, its budget vote must be a two-step process. The first step sets tax millage that would maintain revenue neutrality. A second vote is required by law to demonstrate the disparity between the two levies.

The county’s preliminary budget was prepared with several issues yet to be resolved. It contains only contractually obligated raises, but the county has yet to hammer out a contract with its largest union, Service Employees International. The county knows health insurance costs will rise 8 percent, but it does not yet know what its vision insurance will cost. Neither has it received an estimate for costs associated with employees’ retirement.

Uncertainty surrounds the Act 13 impact fee from unconventional natural gas wells because of a Supreme Court decision, so the county has zeroed out that category until state officials have an opportunity to complete their review of the court case.

Washington County budgeted $1.5 million in revenue from Act 13 for 2016. This is separate from the $2 million in revenue the county receives from wells it has at Cross Creek County Park and from natural gas extracted from the Marcellus Shale beneath other Washington County properties such as the fairgrounds and health center.

Trimming must take place in budget categories because projected expenditures exceed revenues by $1,037,998. The coroner’s office, for example, has requested a 19 percent increase in expenses, and as of late Thursday, Coroner Tim Warco was the only official who had not scheduled a budget hearing for later this month. The county budgeted $690,778 for the coroner’s office this year, and the coroner has requested a budget of $824,000 for 2017.

Commission Chairman Larry Maggi, president of the California University of Pennsylvania Board of Trustees, was participating in inauguration ceremonies for Cal U. President Geraldine Jones on Friday and could not immediately be reached for comment on the preliminary budget.

The county advertised budget hearings beginning at 9 a.m. Monday, Oct. 24, and lasting during business hours through Thursday, Oct. 27.

A posted budget will be made available for public inspection in November, and the commissioners expect to adopt the 2017 at their final scheduled meeting of the year at 10 a.m. Thursday, Dec. 15.

The Washington and McGuffey school districts took Washington County to court in 2008 demanding a reassessment. After running out of legal options and facing a contempt of court finding, the commissioners agreed in 2013 to award a contract to Tyler Technologies to conduct a reassessment.

Among elected officials, Prothonotary Joy Schury Ranko has asked for a 28.5 percent increase in her row office under “other services,” and an overall increase in 2017 to $714,912 from $678,596. The reason is what she hopes is a money-maker for the county: processing passport applications and renewals.

Federal security tightened for travel in 2009, requiring passports in many places and situations where other documents once sufficed. Passports for adults are valid for 10 years, but children under 15 must keep passports current every five years.

The main post office in Washington, plus post offices in McMurray and Charleroi, process passport applications, but Ranko campaigned last year to expand the service to the prothonotary’s office to help relieve a backlog at the post offices.

“Being a public servant, that’s what we’re supposed to be doing,” she said Friday. By appointment, passport applicants would be photographed in the prothonotary’s office. Ranko and her staff would train online, and she hopes to have the service available by February.