Featured
Building a budget that survives a state impasse: what to fund from reserves and what to defer
It is budget season, and the proposed numbers for next year are sitting on the manager’s desk in townships across Montgomery and Chester counties. The revenue lines look familiar. The question this year is different: what happens to those lines if Harrisburg misses its deadline again? That is not a hypothetical. Pennsylvania has blown past…
MCATO Updates
Fall Conference Dates to Be Announced Soon
We encourage everyone to join our newsletter or check back often as we will be announcing our 2026 Fall Convention Date in a few days.
MCATO Hospitality Suite Invite: Sun 4/19 & Mon 4/20
MCATO members are invited to join the PSATS Hospitality Suite, located in the Starlight Room at The Hotel Hershey, on April 19 and 20 from…
Continue Reading MCATO Hospitality Suite Invite: Sun 4/19 & Mon 4/20
Township Insights
Data centers and your residents’ electric bills: what a township can and cannot control
A resident calls the township office, and the question is not about a pothole or a permit. It is about the electric bill, which jumped…
Get your data center zoning in place before the application lands: the Upper Merion lesson
Upper Merion thought it had this handled. After hearing that a developer was scouting sites, township officials spent more than a year building a data…
The new Working Pennsylvanians Tax Credit and 2026 changes residents will ask about
The phone rings at the township office and it is not about a pothole or a permit. A resident heard something on the news about…
Continue Reading The new Working Pennsylvanians Tax Credit and 2026 changes residents will ask about
Cybersecurity on a small budget: the free CISA resources to start with (and what changed at MS-ISAC)
A township manager in Montgomery County opens the budget file and finds the same line every small office finds: nothing set aside for cybersecurity. No…