East Penn Township is trading renting for owning when it comes to one piece of maintenance equipment.

The board of supervisors voted Monday night to purchase a skid-steer loader for just over $62,000 from Cleveland Brothers.Also included in the motion was the purchase of a pickup broom and power rake for $5,439 and $8,350 respectively.All items will be purchased through Pennsylvania's cooperative purchasing program, COSTARS, according to Supervisor Chairman William Schwab.The township paid almost $10,000 in 2015 to rent a skid loader."For what we paid for 90 days of renting it," Supervisor Richard DeLuca said, "we could own one and spend less per year."East Penn will now look into financing options for the equipment.It has a proposal from CAT that calls for a 10-year financing plan at a 3.25 percent interest rate."We're going to work with local banks and see where we can get the best 10-year deal," DeLuca said.Generator to be replacedThe township will also spend money on a new generator for its municipal office.The Kohler generator, which will be installed by L&S Electric, costs $9,800."We have one that is 41 years old," Schwab said. "There was a problem with it and it wouldn't start. L&S just can't get parts for it anymore."Supervisors said the purchase was necessary because if the power goes out, they do need service to the building."If we don't have power, we can't get the garage doors open for our trucks," Schwab said.Supervisor Deanna Cunfer said power outages are frequent on that end of the township.Social hallSupervisors approved a motion Monday calling for proposals from architects who could tell the township what improvements need to be made to its social hall."This would allow an architect to tell us what it would cost for them to study the facility and tell us what we could or could not do with it," Schwab said.There has been debate over whether to move township offices to the social hall.Cunfer said she doesn't want to compromise the size of the social hall, while Schwab said the current township office is overcrowded and there is no privacy for any conversations to take place.Eight functions were held at the social hall last year."We can't put the cart before the horse," DeLuca said. "We have a loan at 3.75 percent that we are paying on the building right now. We'll have to look at our expenses and see what we can afford."