PA: Westmont Borough Council refuses CamTran's funding level request for 2026, reduces contribution

Public transportation in Westmont Borough, including operation of the Johnstown Inclined Plane, could be reduced as a result of a resolution of Westmont Borough Council, Cambria County Transit Authority officials said.

CamTran is asking Westmont Borough taxpayers to pay more than $13,000 for services in 2026 – but, faced with declining local revenues, council members said they won’t consider paying that amount unless CamTran releases more details about how that figure was derived and whether borough residents’ ridership warrants the payment.

The council’s resolution Wednesday to reduce its CamTran contribution to $5,000 may not alone put strain on CamTran’s $18 million operating budget, but it has a direct effect on losing greater sources of CamTran’s operational funds from the state.

CamTran Executive Director Rose Lucey-Noll said CamTran’s request of $13,412 from the borough is required for CamTran to receive a state match of more than $100,000.

The council’s resolution to reduce its local share to $5,000 means CamTran will lose $8,412 in local funds and $67,000 in state funds, she said.

Council member Tim McIlwain is president of McIlwain School Bus Lines and McIlwain Charters and Tours. He also serves on the Johnstown-Cambria County Airport Authority and is a commercial pilot.

“As a member of council, nobody on the council is more of an advocate for mass transportation than myself,” McIlwain said. “I know how critical it is for communities across the country. That being said, we receive an arbitrary number every year to pay to CamTran, and it continues to rise. ...

“The borough understands it’s important, and we want to maintain it, but we also have a fiduciary responsibility to balance a budget each year and maintain our borough in a good financial position.”

The council could still change its payment through mid-December, when CamTran and Westmont Borough budgets are due.

Lucey-Noll said municipal shares for CamTran services are based on a formula set years ago by the Cambria County Planning Commission, an agency independent of CamTran.

That formula calculates local shares for municipalities across Cambria County based on each municipality’s census and miles covered by buses, she said. The county government also pays a share.

The local contributions are required to maintain levels of state funding from PennDOT.

With the passage of Act 44 in 2007, each local transportation agency in the state, including CamTran, has been required to pay local matches that increase annually, by a minimum of 5% over the previous year’s amount, in order to maintain state allocations.

Operational revenue including bus fares cannot be used toward the local contribution, according to a fact sheet published by PennDOT.

The 5% increases stop when the local match reaches 15% of the state allocation. If the minimum required local matching funds are not provided, the following year’s state allocation to the local transportation agency will be reduced, and that reduced allocation is carried forward.

County tax dollars form the largest local contribution to CamTran. In the past year, the Cambria County commissioners paid more than $900,000, which secured a $9 million state allocation for CamTran’s budget.

“If we’d vote to reduce it, state money would be left on the table, and you can’t get it back,” Cambria County President Commissioner Scott Hunt said. “That’s not a position I want to be in.”

He took a phone interview from his office at the Cambria County Courthouse in Ebensburg. A CamTran bus passed his window, he said, as he spoke with The Tribune-Democrat.

“Unless state law changes, I’ll be voting to approve the county’s local share,” he said. “I don’t see another way.”

CamTran is asking the Cambria County commissioners for a local share of $988,314 in 2026.

The commissioners are to vote on the county’s local share before December ends. That vote could likely be 2-1 in favor of approving CamTran’s requested payment.

Commissioners Hunt and Thomas Chernisky said they plan to approve the amount CamTran asks. Commissioner Keith Rager said he would vote against it.

“I’m tired of that threat, that if we don’t give them a seven-digit figure, that the state will cut their funding,” Rager said. “Well, whoop-dee-doo. Sharpen your pencils and run a better operation than you are now.”

Chernisky said he is a staunch supporter of CamTran.

“Public transportation is great for our area,” he said. “As a commissioner, when I talk to businesses about opening in our area, our public transportation is among the top three or four things that they like.”

Chernisky said he takes the bus in the northern part of the county at least once a year to meet people who regularly use the service.

“I see people of all ages using it to go to and from work, doctors’ offices, and for visits,” he said. “I’ve met a woman who takes the bus five days a week to visit her husband at a nursing home.”

Aside from the Cambria County commissioners, 16 municipalities of the county also contribute local shares to CamTran, which draws more state funding. The city of Johnstown, Richland Township and Westmont Borough pay the largest local shares to CamTran of all contributing municipalities, Lucey-Noll said.

Ed Dreikorn, a Westmont Borough resident and vice president of CamTran’s board of directors, attended the council meeting Wednesday at the borough municipal building, 1000 Luzerne St. He advocated for the council to contribute a local share in the amount CamTran requested.

In a phone interview after the meeting, he stressed that when state money is reduced along with local funds, it won’t come back.

“We will always have reduced services,” he said.

In addition to its fixed bus routes, CamTran provides a medical assistance transportation program and a complementary paratransit service that sends buses, with wheelchair lifts, directly to riders’ homes.

CamTran’s mass transit services also include the Johnstown Inclined Plane, which has been under a $17 million upgrade project since February 2022. If state funding tied to Westmont Borough’s local contribution is lost, then hours of operation for the Inclined Plane may be reduced when it reopens, he said.

“We (CamTran) have money to fix it, but that doesn’t include operating costs,” Dreikorn said. “It’s a very big attraction for the local community and everybody wants it to be running, and it’s a part of that mass transit plan along with buses and shuttles.”

Council members said the annual contribution required by CamTran is always increasing and always expected by CamTran to be rubber-stamped. But the council has questions – for example, whether the 53 bus stops in the borough could be reduced to save costs.

“Our budgets are tight, and this is an area we could cut,” council finance committee Chairman Bill Stasko said.

In the past fiscal year, 3,875 passengers touched down in Westmont from a CamTran fixed route bus, and 3,651 passengers boarded a bus in Westmont, according to CamTran.

Stasko said that if CamTran provides more information about the formula at the root of its funding request, as well as more detailed information about ridership, then he may consider revisiting Westmont’s local share for CamTran services.

Preliminary 2026 budget approved

The council also approved a preliminary $2.8 million budget for 2026 with no tax increase Wednesday.

Stasko said the spending plan for the year, which currently includes no more than a $5,000 contribution to CamTran, is projected to cover the year’s expenses and end with a surplus of $48,000. But that projected surplus could “vanish in a heartbeat,” he said.

Real estate tax collections are down and could decline further, or snowstorms could require the borough’s highway crew to purchase more salt. Those are just a couple variables that could cause the borough to spend more in 2026 than expected, Stasko said.

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