Fairfax County Executive Bryan Hill proposed a new budget Tuesday that would raise the tax rate for homeowners by 4 cents, a move driven in part by a desire for more school and transportation spending.
“Balancing this proposed budget has required some difficult decisions,” he said. “Our revenue increase at the current real estate tax rate will not support these expenditure increases.”
The proposed $5.4 billion spending plan, based on a residential tax rate of $1.135 per $100 of assessed value, comes after the board of supervisors declined to increase the tax rate for several years to offset the economic impacts of the pandemic on Fairfax residents.
Last year, the board lowered the tax rate by 2 cents, although higher assessments on homes and automobiles caused in part by inflation still meant that residents’ annual bills were higher.
This year, Hill said, the county is facing demands to steer about $165 million more toward county schools, largely to cover employee compensation increases reached in collective bargaining agreements and expenses related to higher enrollment.
The county’s own union agreements have also meant spending $148 million more on employee pay and benefits. Among other things, the pay scales for police officers and firefighters will increase by 3 percent, while general employees will get 2 percent raises based on what surrounding jurisdictions pay their workers.
Meanwhile, the county’s portion of funding for Metro will increase by $10 million to help that agency deal with lower ridership and repair needs, Hill said.
To avoid a higher tax rate, Hill recommended $36 million in spending cuts and savings, including a net reduction of 42 jobs, either through retirements or by not filling open positions. Those savings, he said, will help address calls for more park improvements, early-childhood education programs and information technology spending.
In the budget proposal, which the board of supervisors will vote on in early May, Hill set aside $3.83 million to allow for some flexibility with spending priorities — a far thinner cushion than he’s left in recent budget proposals.
But he suggested that the board advertise a higher tax rate ceiling in the face of uncertainties over how much the state will allocate toward public school funding and to Metro, which is facing a $750 million budget deficit in the next fiscal year.
County board members did not appear surprised by Hill’s proposal, saying they’ve been aware of the county’s office vacancy rate of 17.2 percent, which has led to lower commercial property tax revenue — and earlier calls by school officials for the county to steer more funding their way.
School funding represents 49 percent of Hill’s spending plan. But it does not fully cover the $254 million that Fairfax Schools Superintendent Michelle Reid requested from the county in her proposed budget.
Jeffrey C. McKay (D), chair of the county board, called Reid’s request “entirely unrealistic” after Hill’s presentation was finished.
He also criticized the state General Assembly for not steering more state money toward public school systems, citing a Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission report published in July that shows that Virginia ranks below Maryland, West Virginia and Kentucky in state funding on schools, spending about $1,900 per student less than the national average.
“That’s embarrassing,” McKay said. “We would have $345 million more to invest in all the priorities we just heard [about] if the state simply met the national average for public education funding. That’s a lot of money.”
Supervisor Pat Herrity (R-Springfield) called for the board to appoint a citizens commission to audit county spending over several years to help further cut costs.
He noted that the average increase of $524 in annual residential tax bills under Hill’s proposal amounts to a nearly 7 percent hike from the current budget, after those tax bills had gone up in previous years due in large part to the rising assessments.
If adopted, that increase “is unsustainable,” Herrity told Hill. “It’s not surprising. But it’s disappointing that we’re here.”
