The tax rate will remain the same as last year’s millage rate at 3.78 percent according to Lehigh County Executive Phillips Armstrong.

He made the announcement during a presentation Aug. 27 at the Lehigh County Administration Building, 17 S. Seventh St., Allentown, Aug. 27.

“We have been working with the board of commissioners,” Armstrong said in a bid to gain bipartisan support for the proposed 2021 budget. “Our goal is to do what is right.”

Last year’s vote on the budget was 7-2, with one Republican commissioner voting with the Democrat majority to pass the budget.

Remarking on the savings in printing costs by putting the proposed budget online via the county website, Armstrong ceremoniously handed over a two-volume printed budget to the two commissioners attending the announcement, Republican Marc Grammes and Democrat David Harrington.

Armstrong said the proposed budget continues a $25-million stabilization fund.

“The use of which has so far enabled us to make it through the coronavirus pandemic,” Armstrong said. “Hats off to the Lehigh County workers who have kept the county going 24 hours a day, seven days a week. We never shut down the county.”

Armstrong said $114 million of the $457 million budget comes from property taxes with the balance provided by state and federal pass-through funds.

Armstrong said labor, medical expenses and pension contributions account for most of the county’s expenses.

More than $33.3 million in federal CARES Act funding and $5 million in federal stimulus to Cedarbrook Senior Care and Rehabilitation are included in the budget as revenue.

No cuts in the county Sheriff’s Department budget are reflected in the budget.

Armstrong said a “nonessential hiring freeze” implemented earlier in response to the pandemic will continue.

Farmland preservation will continue as a spending priority with $1 million earmarked for the program.