City resident and frequent council critic Sam Troy speaks to Wilkes-Barre officials during Thursday night’s meeting.
Sam Zavada | Times Leader
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WILKES-BARRE — City council approved Mayor George Brown’s proposed 2025 general fund budget on the first of two required readings on Thursday night.
The full details of the budget were described by the mayor at Tuesday evening’s work session.
The budget contains no tax or fee increases and includes $58.46 million in total revenue and expenditures, a 7.7% increase from the 2024 budget total of $54.25 million.
Prior to the council’s regular session at 6 p.m., a public meeting was held in which members of the public were able to express their questions and concerns regarding the proposed budget. Frequent council critic Sam Troy and Saylorsburg resident Jason Carr critiqued the budget’s details.
The four attending council members — Bill Barrett, Mike Belusko, Stan Mirin and Jessica McClay — unanimously approved the proposal.
The decision, along with councilman Tony Brooks’ absence from Thursday’s meeting, drew the particular ire of Troy.
“This is a critical issue to vote on this budget, as I see it,” Troy said. “To have only four out of five [council members] here … that’s not responsible. That’s not responsible government.”
Brooks, who also serves as the executive director of the Wilkes-Barré Preservation Society, was at the Greater Wyoming Valley Chamber of Commerce’s Annual Dinner on Thursday night. He received the Chamber’s Lifetime Achievement Award.
A second reading and confirmation vote on the budget will take place at a future council meeting, of which there are three remaining in 2024.
The mayor’s proposed 2025 budget is available to read in full on the city website.
Council also:
• Approved, on a first reading, amending File of Council No. 15 of 2013 entitled “Police Civil Service Commission — Rules and Regulations for Hiring and Promotion” by adding an Appendix “A.” The appendix features six sub-sections, covering employment; additional authorizations for employment in the Police Department, authorization to fill without compensation; qualifications; recruitment; selection and probation; and termination. The termination sub-section (A6) was a later addition to the appendix.
• Resolved a trio of grants from the Commonwealth Financing Authority in the amounts of $500,000 to be used for two new 2025 cab and chassis refuse trucks with 20 cubic yard rear compaction mounted on them; $587,435 to be used for the King’s College Safety and Security Project Phase 2; and $110,772 to be used for the Domestic Violence Safety Center (DVSC) HVAC replacement project.