HOLLIDAYSBURG — Blair County commissioners — who voted unanimously Tuesday to adopt a 2025 budget with an 8% increase in property taxes — are pledging to keep an eye on spending while following through on efforts to improve employee wages and build a prison.

The $53.04 million spending plan will be balanced with the help of $3.56 million in reserve funds and revenue generated by an increase in real estate taxes for the second consecutive year. The 2024 tax increase was just over 10.3%.

The 2025 tax increase adds 0.361 mills to the current levy of 4.522 mills for a new levy of 4.883 mills.

For the owner of property assessed at $100,000, the 2025 rate translates into an annual bill of $488.30 in comparison to the 2024 bill of $452.22. That amount doesn’t include property taxes levied by municipalities and school districts which set their own millage rates.

Finance Director Lindsay Dempsie, who worked with commissioners to develop the 2025 budget, asked Tuesday for a vote in favor of the version reviewed at a Nov. 21 presentation.

Commissioners, who introduced that version at their Dec. 3 meeting, authorized it to be advertised as available for public review through Tuesday when commissioners voted to adopt the spending plan.

There have been no changes, Dempsie told them.

As adopted, the 2025 budget includes $2.14 million for to-be-determined wage increases that have been under development through in-house salary studies aimed at updating the county’s compensation scale.

The budget also includes money within a capital reserve fund that could pay for land where a new county prison will be built. But the 2025 budget has no money set aside for design and construction costs, which commissioners said would likely be financed through a bond issue which provides money for the project, to be paid off over several years.

Commissioners Chairman Dave Kessling said Tuesday that the feasibility study for a new county prison is scheduled to be finished in January.

Commissioners Amy Webster and Laura Burke, who commissioned the study with former commissioner Bruce Erb, said it identifies and compares three sites, in Allegheny and Blair townships, with one of the sites identified as more favorable.

Local real estate broker Richard Johnston, who offered his assistance in helping the county find the site, has been speaking with the affected landowners, Webster said.

Kessling, who is finishing his first year in office and supported the 8% tax increase which he referred to as “minimal,” spoke of efforts that he said commissioners made this year and will continue making to control spending.

“I think this board has worked hard over 2024,” Kessling said. “We made a lot of spending cuts and the plan is to continue to do that over 2025 so we don’t always end up at the beginning of a new year being so far in debt.”

While Dempsie’s initial 2025 budget showed expenditures exceeding revenue by $9 million, the adopted plan — after budget cuts and the tax increase — reduced the shortage to about $3.56 million. To balance the budget, that shortage will be offset by money from the county’s reserve funds, projected at $15.6 million at the beginning of 2025.

Burke also mentioned that, because money from post-COVID programs is no longer available to the county, future decisions have to rely on the amounts allocated within the budget, as she said she learned during her first year in office.

“If it’s not in the budget, it doesn’t happen,” she said.

She also mentioned her desire to see efforts move forward.

“One challenge we put out there for the department heads … is that if they have plans and budget money, then we want to see the actual progress and implementation of what we’re budgeting for,” Burke said.

Kessling and Webster offered similar sentiments.

“There’s already been a couple of departments asking for additional positions beyond what’s budgeted and we said no,” Kessling said. “We just said we’re not doing this. We want to be supportive of our elected officials and department heads, but we want to be smart about it too.”

Webster also spoke of her repeated requests for departments to consider budget cuts, especially in connection with requests for salary increases that will be up for approval in 2025.

“We’ve made it clear to the departments that they need to cut back on a lot of things, things that might not be necessary, and maybe even some people,” Webster said.

Burke also mentioned that many counties in Pennsylvania are increasing taxes this year and referred to Dauphin County’s increase. Commissioners there levied a 21.8% percent increase for 2025, the first increase in 19 years.

A sampling of other counties showed Lackawanna County levying a 33% increase, Delaware County levying a 23% increase, Northumberland County levying a 10% increase and Berks County levying an 8% increase.

“Ours is fairly modest compared to what some of our counterparts are levying,” Burke said.

Mirror Staff Writer Kay Stephens is at 814-946-7456.