Lehighton Area School District property owners will not see a real estate tax increase in 2024-25 as the governing body looks to lean on its fund balance to make up a projected deficit nearing $4 million.

Directors unanimously passed a budget Thursday night calling for $50.59 million in expenses against $46.91 million in revenue.

Should the budget numbers hold true, Lehighton would start with 2024-25 with a combined $10.28 million assigned and unassigned fund balance and end the fiscal year with $6.9 million remaining.

In choosing not to impose a tax increase, directors cited past conservative revenue estimates leading to a reserve at the end of the year.

“Last year we came in with $3.17 million more in revenue than what was estimated,” director Barbara Bowes said in May.

During a budget meeting in May, directors agreed to add several new positions for 2024-25 including three elementary center teachers, middle school music teacher, high school emotional support teacher, high school behavior interventionist, three paraprofessionals, and three cleaners. The district also budgeted for five data coordinators, which are stipend positions.

Several changes were made prior to Thursday’s meeting including the elimination of the behavior interventionist and middle school paraprofessional position as well as reducing the three cleaners from full- to part-time.

“The original request was three full-time custodians,” acting superintendent Jack Corby said, “but what we are proposing is to make those part-time positions in conjunction with increasing the pay $2 an hour for the 14 people we already have on staff. We have tremendous turnover in that position. It pays about $10 or $11 an hour and we’re trying to give folks an incentive to stay.”

The change, Corby said, will save the district about $145,000.

Directors did agree to change a middle school secretary position from a 10-month to a 12-month job, which adds $11,000.

The new positions were originally estimated to add $1.2 million to the budget but with the adjustments that number dropped to just over $700,000.

The district is set to see a $265,189 increase in a formula driven student allocation from the state but awaits word on whether the governor’s proposed $1.82 million adequacy investment will pass.

Special education funding is set to increase by $91,111.