In a 2-1 vote, Lebanon County Commissioners on Thursday approved a $94.4 million budget for 2024, which includes at tax increase.

The 0.5-mill increase sets the millage rate at 4.3925 mills. This is the third time commissioners have had to raise taxes since 2016.

The average assessed value of homes throughout Lebanon County is just above $250,000, according to officials. Most homeowners with that value would see their taxes increased by $78.50, or $6.50 a month on average. Homes valued at $150,000 would see a $47.10 increase, and homes valued at $350,000 would see a $109.90 increase.

The tax increase comes from increased costs, but particularly labor costs in the county after taking efforts like raising salaries to curb low retention of county employees as well as an increased deficit in the county budget. During the meeting on the preliminary budget, officials announced that the county had at deficit of $5 million, after taking steps to bring it down from $7.5 million in November.

“We had a large deficit in 2016, which resulted in a millage increase. It took about five years, until 2021, we had another significant deficit which was around $6 million, there was a millage increase for that,” said County Administrator Jamie Wolgemuth. “In two short years we find ourselves with a $5 million dollar deficit, a result of the things that I just mentioned. It came very quickly.”

“We bear costs just like anyone else. We have energy costs, we have labor costs, we have materials costs. We’re not immune to inflation.”

At the Lebanon County Correction Facility in 2022, commissioners raised wages from $16 an hour to $21 an hour. At the beginning of 2022, the jail had 44 vacant positions out of 75 correctional officers, but went down to eight vacancies by the end of that year.

Wolgemuth said that their efforts to fill and retain positions in the county have been fruitful. Out of the 700 positions in the county, around 620 of them are filled.

In 2024, both union and nonunion contracts will be increasing by 4% in the budget. Health insurance costs will also be increasing by 2%.

The preliminary budget allotted the county a $199,187 surplus. However, because of an increase in the 911 surcharge fee passed by the Pennsylvania Legislature in mid December, the county will have a surplus of about $480,000 in 2024.

To put the figure into perspective, Wolgemuth said the number represented about a day and a half of the operating cost for the county.

The surcharge increase, which takes effect in March, will raise the surcharge about 30 cents. Some 85% of the funds go towards operating the county 911 system, with the remaining 15% going to PEMA. With the new surcharge, about 1/4 of the cost of the 911 system will be covered by the county, opposed to covering a third of the cost under the previous rate.

Other than the 911 surcharge, Wolgemuth said that there were only minor adjustments between the preliminary budget and the approved budget, such as district attorney’s salary, which is handed down by the state, which resulted in a couple thousand dollar adjustment and the sheriff’s office requesting three of their administrative employees moving from 35 hours a week to 40 hours a week.

County Commissioner Jo Ellen Litz voted against the budget, citing concerns about costs, particularly in the correctional facility.

“I don’t think we did everything we could,” Litz said. “I mean Jamie and Angel did a fabulous job, but I still think we need to get these things out for bid to keep a handle on that budget.”

Before the vote, Litz brought up concerns with the cost of medical care at the jail, and wanted to see the contract, currently held by PrimeCare, put up for bid.

Litz said that the renewal of the contract increased the cost by 3% to a total of $3,537,682, about a quarter of the entire budget for the jail.

She gave a motion to put the contract up for bid, which was not seconded.

County Commissioner Mike Kuhn said that while he would not be opposed to seeking bids, he believed the first step is to establish a request for proposal to identify the county’s needs.

“What PrimeCare is doing for the county, long before I took this position,” Kuhn said. “The county had significant exposure and was subject to a lawsuit, and lost a lot of money because we didn’t provide comprehensive services, and that’s one of the key things that PrimeCare is doing.”

Wolgemuth pointed out that when the county first contracted PrimeCare in 2019 for a cost of around $3 million, there were very few players in the industry, and believes that today they would have an even harder time finding correctional healthcare providers.

He also said that when they renewed the contract with PrimeCare in 2022, they only increased cost by 1%. In 2023, they negotiated a 3% increase in the renewal. He added that this increases were well below the consumer price index for medical.

“To me, those are reasonable renewals under the circumstances and the environment,” he said. “They also achieved for us during COVID, an accreditation for correctional healthcare, a national accreditation for standards in correctional healthcare.”

If they do go out to bid, he added, PrimeCare could potentially cancel their current contract or substantially raise their price for the county.

“You may end up with one bidder and one number,” he said.

Daniel Larlham Jr. is a reporter for the Lebanon Daily News. Reach him at DLarlham@LDNews.com or on X @djlarlham.

This article originally appeared on Lebanon Daily News: Lebanon CountyPA approves 2024 budget with tax hike