{"id":53141,"date":"2025-12-05T16:37:07","date_gmt":"2025-12-05T16:37:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/53141\/"},"modified":"2025-12-05T16:37:07","modified_gmt":"2025-12-05T16:37:07","slug":"reading-risks-deep-cuts-without-tax-hike-administration-says-pennsylvania","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/53141\/","title":{"rendered":"Reading risks deep cuts without tax hike, administration says | Pennsylvania"},"content":{"rendered":"

This story was produced by\u00a0the Berks County Bureau of Spotlight PA<\/a>, an independent, nonpartisan newsroom. Sign up for Good Day, Berks, a daily dose of essential local stories at\u00a0spotlightpa.org\/newsletters\/gooddayberks<\/a>.<\/p>\n

READING \u2014 Monday may be the\u00a0last chance for residents<\/a>\u00a0to give their opinions about the City of Reading proposed 2026 budget. City Council currently is scheduled to vote on the 9% property tax increase after discussing around $1 million in cuts this week.<\/p>\n

A home valued at $100,000 would see a $163 property tax increase under the proposal, and the city would generate an estimated $1.8 million to help cover the growing structural deficit, Finance Director Jamar Kelly told Spotlight PA this week. The mayor\u2019s administration presented a different millage rate in October that reflected a 6% tax increase, but did not include the mils dedicated to the shade tree and library funds.<\/p>\n

City Council members and the\u00a0elected auditor<\/a>\u00a0have discussed lowering the increase because of the back-to-back hikes at the\u00a0county level<\/a>\u00a0in 2024 and 2025. The mayor\u2019s administration argues the current proposal is already the lowest reasonable request given the\u00a0growing deficit<\/a>\u00a0without instituting\u00a0citywide staff reductions<\/a>, and possible service cuts.<\/p>\n

\u201cNine percent is just a down payment on this growing structural deficit,\u201d Kelly said at a city council committee meeting Wednesday. He continued that he believed another 9% raise would be reasonable in about two years.<\/p>\n

Kelly said that he would \u201cdefinitely have to ask for at least 25% next year\u201d if the 9% increase did not pass. He and Managing Director Jack Gombach said the only way to avoid it would be \u201cmass layoffs.\u201d<\/p>\n

Approximately 70% of the budget is tied into personnel costs (salary, healthcare, pensions, extra benefits), which will only grow as new union contracts negotiate raises and healthcare prices go up.<\/p>\n

The city could consider cutting vacant positions, but the majority of open roles are in the police and fire departments. Cutting five of the 27 open police patrol positions would save the city approximately $1 million annually, Kelly estimated. However, the administration is trying to recruit for those positions, not cut them, Gombach said.<\/p>\n

Council President Donna Reed suggested delaying a final vote on the budget until Dec. 15, but the decision was not made.<\/p>\n

The council went over some cost cutting measures Wednesday, potentially eliminating around $1 million in expenses ranging from the upgrade of certain public works vehicles and postponing a scheduled $350,000 demolition. Councilors are also considering cutting management level raises \u2014 which are outside union jurisdiction \u2014 from 3.5% to 3%. The final decisions on those cuts will come Monday<\/p>\n

The mayor\u2019s administration agreed at the beginning of the meeting to rescind requests for new employee positions, including a deputy managing director, fire training lieutenant, and downtown activities coordinator.<\/p>\n

The city ran a\u00a0$1.9 million deficit in 2024<\/a>\u00a0and expects similar, or larger, in 2025 and 2026 depending on the amount of earned income and real estate taxes collected. Gombach said the goal is to avoid returning to state-declared financial distress.<\/p>\n

City Council is scheduled to hear public opinion and vote on the budget Dec. 8, though councilors may choose to delay the vote to Dec. 15. Council members may still propose new amendments to the budget beyond the changes accepted Wednesday.<\/p>\n

BEFORE YOU GO\u2026\u00a0If you learned something from this article, pay it forward and contribute to Spotlight PA at\u00a0spotlightpa.org\/donate<\/a>. Spotlight PA is funded by\u00a0foundations and readers like you<\/a>\u00a0who are committed to accountability journalism that gets results.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"This story was produced by\u00a0the Berks County Bureau of Spotlight PA, an independent, nonpartisan newsroom. Sign up for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":53142,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[222,61,7855,18524,17259,128,130,129,2261],"class_list":{"0":"post-53141","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-reading","8":"tag-budget","9":"tag-economy","10":"tag-government-finances","11":"tag-property-tax","12":"tag-public-finance","13":"tag-reading-city","14":"tag-reading-city-headlines","15":"tag-reading-city-news","16":"tag-tax"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53141","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=53141"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53141\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/53142"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=53141"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=53141"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=53141"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}