Lower Towamensing Township’s proposed budget for 2024 has no tax increase.

On Tuesday night, the supervisors approved advertising the budget, which keeps the tax rate at 2.5 mills.

Last year, the township passed a .9-mill tax increase to raise money for employee benefits and equipment purchases, said Brent Green, the chairman of the supervisors.

The total proposed budget for 2024 is $926,140.34.

The township’s largest expense is the Public Works Department, which handles street maintenance. The budget includes supplies for road repairs and employee costs which is expected to $538,993.05.

General government expenses for office supplies, auditing, heating, web hosting and more total $121,448.28. Public safety expenses for the fire department’s needs, zoning salary, zoning services and various other costs total $105,888.17.

The remaining costs are sewer system engineering and sewage engineering at $75,000, recreation costs related to the parks at $56,013.26, and insurance costs totaling $28,797.60.

The Fire Fund is showing a net income of $175 for a $56,100 budget, Green said. The Fire Hydrant Fund has a net income of $1,301 with a total budget of $2,375. And the Streetlight Fund has a budget of $9,772.19 with an income of $322.19.

The Garbage Fund is expected to have a deficit.

The township anticipates an income from solid waste (garbage) collection and related income at $309,065 for the Garbage Fund, but the expenses could total as much as $360,661.56, resulting in a $51,596.56 deficit, Green said.

“With the exception of the garbage fund, they’re either balanced or we have surpluses in the fund,” Green said. “A large part of that expenditure in deficit is because of our admin. costs that we have been assigning but we haven’t really been using, as well as some of the recycling programs that we’ve been talking about doing that are now included in there.”

The largest expense is $291,543.96 to the garbage collection company.

The proposed budget will be up for approval at the supervisors’ next meeting on Dec. 5.