Community Cost Savings
How land is used in a community impacts the type, quality, and extent of local services provided, as well as the taxes that are needed to fund those services. Residential land often costs municipalities and school districts more than other land uses because of the number of students generated by residential land use. With the current school funding structure in Pennsylvania, taxes collected by school districts on residential uses generally do not keep pace with actual per-student costs. For this reason, converting open space to housing (and the need for higher levels of community services such as police and fire protection, road maintenance, public water or sewer, etc.) generally has a negative fiscal impact on local government.
As of November of 2018, eleven Chester County municipalities have conducted Cost of Community Services (COCS) studies. The table below summarizes the findings. In all eleven municipalities, COCS studies show that residential land contributed less, on average, to municipal and school district revenue than it required back in expenditures.
Summary of Findings, Cost of Community Services Studies in Chester County
