Crafton workshop recommends bond funding for police garage floor, cameras and other building repairs

Crafton Borough staff recommended using bond proceeds for several municipal capital projects during the Oct. 9 budget workshop, and flagged additional, unbudgeted infrastructure costs that could reduce available bond balances.

"We are suggesting that we use the bond fund for the police garage floor since that is a typical capital investment and then using the bond fund for the two camera projects," presenter Jim Price said, describing staff recommendations for capital spending tied to recently completed construction and facility improvements.

Why it matters: replacing the police garage floor, upgrading building systems and installing cameras have immediate operational impacts for borough services and public safety. Staff recommended paying for them from bond proceeds rather than raising taxes.

Major items discussed

- Police garage floor: The garage floor is deteriorated and prevents regular use of the garage. Price said estimates ranged from about $30,000 to $80,000; staff proposed using bond funds for the repair.

- Cameras and license-plate readers: Price recommended funding two camera projects from the bond fund; the council discussed locations and broader license-plate-reader proposals (treated in a separate discussion). Staff said updated estimates are still pending.

- Building maintenance and community facilities: Price reviewed a set of smaller facility items: new community-center floor and window treatments, new carpeting in administrative areas, a possible elevator deferral for one more year, and a library childrens-room door estimated as a placeholder. He said the library had unexpected furnace and other repairs this year that delayed some planned work.

- Stage roof and performing-arts MOU: estimates were presented for repairing the stage roof and adjacent structures. Price said a full roof repair across three buildings would cost about $30,000 while just the stage roof is estimated at about $10,000. The borough and the performing-arts group continue to discuss a memorandum of understanding on maintenance responsibility; Price said the performing-arts group had previously raised the question of delaying an MOU until after the elections.

- Hydrant line to new building: Price said staff had not yet fully accounted for the expected cost to run a hydrant line to a new building. He said there are two options: borough crews doing the work (with rental and other costs), or having PA American Water do the connection. Price noted the contractor estimate and observed that using PA American Water could cost more initially but would transfer ongoing infrastructure responsibility to the utility. Price described the hydrant-line option as likely to increase project costs by a low six-figure amount (discussion cited roughly $140,000 as an option for PA American Water to perform the work; staff also flagged approximately $70,000 in related unaccounted costs elsewhere in the bond fund).

Decisions and next steps

Workshop participants gave informal consent to move several capital items into the bond-funded list; staff will obtain updated, vendor-level estimates for camera installs, the garage floor and stage repairs and return with refined numbers at the next meeting. No formal council vote to appropriate bond funds was recorded during the workshop.

Quotes

"We are suggesting that we use the bond fund for the police garage floor since that is a typical capital investment and then using the bond fund for the two camera projects," Jim Price said.

"It's a 140,000. But then we don't ever have to pay or worry about the infrastructure after that," Price said about the option to have PA American Water run the hydrant line.

Workshop participants asked staff to return with updated, vendor-specific estimates for each major capital item before any formal appropriation.