The Franklin Township Sewerage authority approved its $17 million 2024-25 budget at its August 6 virtual meeting.

The Authority is expecting to bring in $17,016,784 in revenue, with $16,365,901 in appropriations, leaving a $650,883 surplus.

The budget includes $3,099,500 in capital appropriations costs for the year. Line items include projects such as the Hamilton Street sewer rehabilitation, the Shirley Avenue pump station and the rebuilding of the Weston Canal pump station.

Authority Executive Director Joe Danielsen said the budget is pretty cut-and-dried.

“Very little of this can we increase or decrease,” he said. “It’s pretty straightforward as the state requires.”

The budget is “pretty anticipatory where expenses are flat, revenue is flat and all projects are going on schedule, as anticipated,” he said.

As far as the capital projects are concerned, Danielsen said, the costs are estimated at this point.

“The way I get these costs, I asked my engineers to scope out these projects, they give us a best effort guess on how much it’s going to be,” he said. “But we don’t know how much they’re going to be for sure until the public bid process concludes. After that, there could re a 10 percent reduction or increase.”

Danielsen said the Authority is carrying about $23 million in debt.

“I think we would be best served by either paying down as much debt as we can, or accumulating as much cash as we can for the next three to five years because of one particular project, that is our Weston Canal pump station build project,” he said. “That project is a very significant project, is very need and will be very costly. That project alone could very well equal $20 million.”

“We reviewed that strategy with our auditor and our financial advisor, and that’s what we all believe is the best course,” Danielsen said.