Anthony Buzard, manager of the Seven Fields Town Park Pool, takes a lifeguard shift at the pool on Friday. Julia Maruca/Butler Eagle

Those looking for a sign of the times may not need to look any further than the Town Park pool in Seven Fields.

Since the beginning of the year, the pool has raised the price of pool memberships and daily rates by 20% for residents and 30% for non-residents. As the price of ice cream bars, candy and snacks from the pool’s Pittsburgh vendor has gone up, the prices on concession items for customers have gone up by $0.25 each. The borough also raised wages for lifeguards from $9 to $15 in order to be more competitive, heading into a summer season where some pools still struggle to field lifeguards.

Prices of supplies, like candy, have gone up at the Seven Fields Town Park Pool due to inflation. Julia Maruca/Butler Eagle

The climbing prices for pool customers and spiking costs for the borough are just a few of the craters left by a meteor shower of nationwide inflation and supply shortages. The impacts of inflation are making bigger dents than ever for the smaller municipalities and boroughs of Butler County.

Borough manager Tom Smith said that inflation is starting to have a “tremendous impact” on projects in Seven Fields.

Beyond the waters of the pool, the borough faces a 5% annual increase in the price of its utility billing software, and saw the cost of paving jump up an additional $13,000 from the planned price of $225,000 projected back in January.

“It may impact next year,” Smith said. “We may have to stop and have to consider that in next year’s budget.”

Lifeguard Zachary Devault, 16, runs the concession stand at the Seven Fields Town Park Pool on Friday. Julia Maruca/Butler Eagle

Asphalt prices — the cause of the $13,000 jump in costs for road resurfacing in the borough this year — are some of the biggest obstacles to overcome, alongside gas issues, he said.

“The contractor went ahead and utilized the clause that they are allowed to charge additional funds that weren’t earmarked for the cost of materials, because asphalt has gone up so much,” he said. “We’ve definitely seen an impact at all levels with the cost of inflation.”

In the nearby borough of Mars, Mayor Gregg Hartung echoed the sentiment that public works departments have struggled with construction and maintenance costs. Mars has also faced challenges from the cost of concrete work needed to fix curbs in the borough.

“Costs are going up on everything from paper clips to concrete and asphalt, to wages for employees,” Hartung said. “It does challenge local officials to have to be creative in managing to get things and prioritize what is essential, and what possibly needs to be put on the wait list for some time in the future.”

The borough will increase pay for police officers from $25 an hour to $27 as of July 1, which Hartung said was to keep up with similar rates in other municipalities like Saxonburg.

“Those types of things, because that’s spread out over the weeks versus a one-time purchase, end up being more of a burden on your budget than ever before, but it’s something you have to do to have good employees,” Hartung said. “We have to find ways to look at our budgets differently to figure out what’s a priority. It’s just like at home — luxury and necessity.”

Supply chain disruptions cause problems for the borough, too, he added. The waiting period after ordering a new police vehicle is upward of a year due to a scarcity of parts from China.

“All of these things add up to be more of a burden when you have a limited budget,” Hartung said. “You can’t increase things because of adding new development because you’re almost 150 years old and you have no place to develop. It’s a matter of being creative with your budget to be able to meet the new demands.”

For borough manager Mary Papik in Saxonburg, the borough’s small size comes as somewhat of a blessing as road repair costs rise.

“We only have 1 square mile. We are very, very small, so we don’t have a lot,” Papik said. “It’s more of an impact probably for townships, because they have miles of road, and anytime gas prices go up, the cost of paving goes up.”

The borough isn’t doing a lot of building right now, she added.

“What we are seeing is a reduction in the number of people who want to rent our rental hall for weddings and events,” Papik said. “I think that's reflective of an individual’s budget — they're just trying to decide, ‘Do I really want to spend $1,500 for a place to have my wedding?’”

In Eau Claire in northeastern Butler County, gas prices have had a significant impact on business, Mayor Bruce Toth said.

“Being out here, we have to drive if we want to buy anything major to Butler or Clarion or Grove City, so the price of gas, it gets pretty expensive traveling back and forth 25 miles,” Toth said. “That’s a big hindrance — that really hurts.”

Blacktop prices have gone up by 40 to 45 percent, he added, and the increases mean that the borough may not be able to do as many road repairs, or complete them as frequently.

“When the inflation gets like this, everybody just kind of goes into survival mode. It’s pretty hard on everybody,” he said. “It affects everything you do. It makes you have to pull everything back and rethink everything.”

He’s seen inflation hit the region in more social ways as well.

“We have two ballfields here (and) you don’t notice as many people showing up for the ball games as you used to,” Toth said. “The price of gas hinders everything. People just quit driving — they have to if they want to eat.”