ZELIENOPLE — The borough council will vote Dec. 14 on a proposed $10.57 million budget for 2016 that shows increased spending but no added taxes.

The borough’s tax rate is 5.31 mills.

A mill equals $1 in tax revenue for each $1,000 of a property’s assessed value.

Each mill generates $28,854.

Borough manager Don Pepe said preparing next year’s budget was difficult because of additional requests for funds that the borough couldn’t give out.

“Our goal was to try to fund everything that needed to be funded without having to hit the taxpayer or consumer hard,” Pepe said. “We’re very sensitive to that.”

He said the budget increase is due to multiple reasons, including costs for equipment, services and wages.

The borough has a 3-mill tax rate for its fire department. The 2016 budget will decrease that to 2 mills.

That one mill will be changed to help fund the community park for capital improvements. Pepe said this can be used for the park swimming pool’s replacement.

The budget also takes ongoing projects into consideration.

The borough is seeking grants for phase two of its Main Street Revitalization project. That phase deals with curb replacement on the north and south ends of Main Street.

Although there is no line item in the budget for the project, which will be funded by loans and grants, services like borough construction, storm sewer and electric fund reserves will be used.

Electric fund totals will increase by over $248,000 to about $5.44 million.

Pepe said the borough has spent more than $1 million for property acquisition and demolition. More than $260,000 was spent on preparation work.

The project was approved for two grants, the $500,000 Anchor Building Grant and $3 million from the state’s Redevelopment Assistance Capital Program.

The highway aid fund from the state Department of Transportation will see a decrease in funds for the second year in a row. Funding will be $150,000, a nearly $16,000 decrease from this year.

And funding for this year decreased to $166,600 from more than $226,000 in 2014.

Pepe said he wasn’t sure why the funding has seen decreases.

However, he said the money will go to paving borough roads.

“Overall, it’s a fair budget,” Pepe said. “We’re trying not to make it where it’s a hardship for anybody and at the same time maintain the responsibilities of what we’ve got to do.”