Middletown Approves Balanced Budget, No Tax Increase

Middletown Township residents will not see a property tax rate increase in 2013.

Council approved its 2013 operating budget, which is balanced at $3,880,720 and the property tax rate will remain at 1.6 mills.

An average residential home assessed at $194,000 will pay $310 in overall property taxes, the same as last year. In 2012, that same average assessed home paid $1,029 in county property tax and $4,316 in school district property taxes, Council President Scott Galloway said. (See attached PDF file.)

The 2013 operating budget includes a few larger, one-time expenses, including excavating sewer trenches, replacing cable guide posts with metal guardrail along a portion of Mt. Alverno and E. Knowlton roads at a cost of $122,000. The township also has planned for increased road resurfacing work in 2013 and increased the library budget by $10,000, Galloway said.

Township Manager Bruce Clark said except for those larger items the remaining budget was actually lower than it was last year and the township does not expect to see those one-time items in future years.

Galloway said the township has only seen a tax rate increase twice since 1995; in 2006 when it purchased the Smedley Tract and in 2010 due to the economic challenges both nationally and locally.

He said in 2012, five of Delaware County's 49 municipalities, Chadds Ford, Chester Heights, Concord, Edgmont and Thornbury, had a lower tax rate than Middletown.