A preliminary budget for 2026 in Westmoreland County reveals a $30 million deficit if approved next month, according to county commissioners. 

This week, Commissioner Doug Chew called the budget "unacceptable," but said they still have time to trim that number down.

"We have a lot of work to continue to work on that before we adopt it in mid-December," Chew said.

Chew said leading up to meeting with commissioners this week, they only had a few days after the state budget was passed to work on the latest draft of the county budget.

"We had to propose it in order to allow it to sit before the public for a certain number of weeks, and with the state budget just recently passed, we didn't have really a strong handle earlier this week on what that meant for our revenue from the state," Chew said. "So now that that's becoming more apparent, it will allow us to really refine the departments that rely on that state funding more and more."

The preliminary spending plan sits at $463 million in expenses, $11 million more than this year.

"Around the middle of the summer, July or August, we begin to ask department heads and external agencies that we fund for their requests for 2026," Chew said. "Several of those requests have already been denied in the budget that we're looking at today, but we have a lot more work to do in order to get us where we need to be, which is a much more fiscally sound budget than where we are today proposed. So the current proposed budget stems largely from what agencies and department heads within Westmoreland County have requested. This is a budget that will not be able to allow Westmoreland County to continue beyond this year, and so we need to realize more cuts in order to make the government financially sound for a few more years."

He said in addition to cuts, more layoffs could be coming.

"I mean, I'm definitely not myself ruling out any layoffs or additional furloughs, but I also want to be clear that that doesn't mean that the people that are furloughed today will not be called back," Chew said.

The exact departments that could be affected the most remain unclear, but Chew stressed that tax increases are off the table.

"For me, that would be a no for me, for the budget," Chew said.

The final budget is due by the end of December.