Royersford Police Budget Top Item for Borough Council

The Royersford Police Department budget is still a divisive topic among the borough's council members, as evidenced by discussion during Tuesday's meeting. 

Councilman John Kring was adamant that the borough was "not going to spend another nickel" on the police department in the 2013 budget. 

At this month's first council meeting two weeks ago, Kring said that the budget included a three percent wage increase but no money for anything else that Chief Kevin Schurr requested. 

Councilman Bruce Burns said he felt that the criminal investigator position the Chief Schurr asked for was a good idea. 

"I'm looking for measures to keep that position, up until we got that [position] there were crimes not getting solved, and now they are," Burns said.

Kring said, "We haven't deemed it necessary by council. Figure it out, Chief. You want an investigator, figure it out. We're not here as council to figure out how to run the department, that's the chief's job." (Schurr was not present at the meeting.)

Mayor John Guest disagreed with the opinion that the borough should eliminate the criminal investigator position. 

"You're taking away a program that's bringing this police department into the 21st century," Guest said.

Victory Park

 Borough manager Michael Leonard reported that the backboards and goals at Victory Park were taken down so that the court could be milled and paved. As mentioned at the last council meeting, the borough received a grant from the Pottstown Health and Wellness Foundation for the park.

Councilman Paul Chrisman, reporting for the Parks and Recreation Committee, said that Victory Park is now closed for the season. The Parks and Recreation Committee is working on bands for next year's Summer Concert Series.

Municipal Tax Ordinance

Solicitor Alan Boroff reported that Montgomery County has asked municipalities to pass an ordinance setting up a new fee structure for collecting delinquent real estate taxes. The county would also be collecting delinquent taxes.

Delinuent taxpayers would be charged 5 percent of the total due as fees, 1 percent as attorney fees, and the interest rate on unpaid taxes would be 9 percent per year.

Leonard said turning over administration of collections to the county is a win-win situation for the borough because their delinquent tax amounts are very small and it would eliminate their costs of collecting those taxes.

"We can't lose in this deal," Leonard said.