Angry taxpayers assailed a 33% Lackawanna County property tax hike Wednesday, but the majority county commissioners defended it as the difficult but right thing to do and passed it.
Commissioners Bill Gaughan and Matt McGloin voted yes on a $167.1 million, 2025 budget that will raise county taxes about $245 a year, or about $20 a month, on the typical tax paying homeowner.
The two Democrats passionately defended what they said they wished they didn’t have to do.
Gaughan recalled “sleepless nights” and said he understands people’s “frustration” and “bewilderment.”
“If Commissioner McGloin and I thought for a second -- after painstakingly going through every single line item in the budget and reviewing it with a team of experts in county finances -- that we could somehow avoid this tax increase or lower it significantly in any way, we would have done it in a heartbeat,” Gaughan said. “The honest answer to all of this, and the honest answer to all of you, is we have no choice.”
McGloin said he and Gaughan spent months working on the budget and clearly explained the tax hike is necessary because past administrations budgeted badly.
“I did not run for Lackawanna County Commissioner to make things worse, and I certainly didn't get into this for things to say the same,” McGloin said. “Believe me when I say ... I feel your frustration. I know people are struggling. I know workers are struggling. I only ran to do what is best. I do not want to make anybody's life harder. And as much as I truly do not like this, please believe me when I say there is no other way.”
Commissioner Chris Chermak, the lone Republican, who offered an alternative budget with a 6.3% tax hike, voted no. Chermak noted taxpayers
struggles.
“Over the past few years, the cost of living has soared. Food, fuel, utilities are more expensive than ever,” Chermak said. “I cannot, in good conscience, support this measure without ensuring that we have done everything possible to reduce wasteful spending and find more efficiencies.”
Chermak failed to get his colleagues to approve a motion to table the budget to find more savings.
“My team has already identified savings,” he said. “I’m confident we can find more.”
Gaughan scoffed at that notion.
The median value of county real estate is $11,000. With tax hike, a property owner with a home valued that much owed $744.37 this year and will owe $989.78 next year.
The property tax will rise from 67.67 to 89.98 mills. A mill is a $1 tax for every $1,000 of assessed value.
This total does not include school district or city, borough or township property taxes, which the county does not control.
Chermak’s budget would have increased the same homeowner’s taxes $47.10 a year, or about $3.93 a month.
Before the budget vote, taxpayers blasted McGloin and Gaughan for ignoring the harsh realities of their everyday lives and refusing to find a compromise with Chermak’s proposal.
Dickson City resident Matt Cirba called the tax hike “unreasonable” and “deeply troubling.”
“The 33% increase is a significant burden, particularly for families and individuals who are already struggling to make the ends meet. This move will undoubtedly strain the finances of many residents, and I believe it will have a long, lasting negative impact on the economic health of our community,” Cirba said.
Tracy Bucksbee, a resident of Whites Crossing in Carbondale Township, said she already lost her home once.
“I have a 16-year-old that has Down syndrome, Bucksbee said. Now I'm scared crapless. How am I going to pay for my house? And I have a daughter with a disability. I have five jobs that I have to take care of. My husband is on disability.”
Renee Czubowicz, of North Abington Township, said residents had to tighten their budgets as heating, gasoline, grocery, insurance and other costs rose the past few years.
“We're all cutting corners, scrimping, saving, and it needs to be scrimping, saving with Lackawanna County too,” she said. “We need to cut the pork. If one budget is at (a) 33% (tax hike) and another budget is down at 6.4%, there has to be a middle ground.”
Some speakers pointed out the county budgeted for next year without completing its 2023 audit or a final report on tackling finances from its financial consultant.
Several speakers challenged Gaughan and McGloin to meet with Chermak and his financial advisers to work out a compromise.
Gaughan said the commissioners worked closely with the financial consultant to develop the budget. He and McGloin argued Chermak’s budget isn’t realistic. They said it relies on a false $17 million one-time federal revenue source that’s only $5 million and won’t repeat next year anyway, creating a new budget gap. The annual use of one-time revenues over several years produced the county’s poor finances, they said.
Chermak’s plan also assumes savings that wouldn’t exist by eliminating crucial Office of Youth and Family Services and jobs, McGloin and Gaughan contend. The full assumed savings wouldn’t happen because the state pays 80% of the cost, they said.
They said the tax hike will end annual deficits that degraded the county’s bond rating and forced borrowing of up to $15 million to finish 2024. The county faced a $37 million 2025 shortfall as budget meetings began and whittled that to about $28 million. The commissioners, Chermak included, voted to approve the borrowing after voting on the budget.
After all the taxpayers spoke, county chief financial officer David Bulzoni called the new budget and its tax hike “a practice in inevitability.”
After running annual operating budget deficits of $4 million, $8 million, $15 million and now $37 million in four consecutive years, a tax hike this large “is inevitable,” he said.
The county’s stagnant tax base, reduced surpluses, sharply higher costs over a decade and routine use of one-time revenue sources also made the tax hike inevitable, he said.
“The practice of using one-time revenues is nothing more than a temporary feeling of elation,” he said. “When it corrects, you experience a budget even more challenging than the prior. “
Bulzoni denied claims he shielded McGloin and Gaughan from alternative budgets.
“Those comments should be considered as much a fantasy as thinking that a real estate tax increase of 6% would be sufficient to bridge a $37 million preliminary budget deficit now,” he said.
He challenged Chermak, who has frequently said he and his advisers have been denied access to budget information in the past.
“This may be considered a novel concept, but if you believe you're being shielded from information, communicate with your fellow commissioners,” Bulzoni said.
In response to a question by McGloin, Bulzoni said the tax hike is appropriate.
Gaughan asked Bulzoni if Chermak’s proposal was feasible.
“No,” Bulzoni said.
Gaughan said people have asked if he’s crazy for not just adopting Chermak’s budget.
"The proposal is poorly put together, and it lacks, honestly, even a basic understanding of county government. The numbers are wrong. They're off by millions of dollars,” he said. “If there was a good idea in there, buried in there someplace, you can bet I would have signed off on it.”
