MAN ABOUT TOWN: 120 Days of Little City Predictions
By GEORGE SOUTHERN
Falls Church Times Staff
March 1, 2010
One of my jobs when stationed overseas was to analyze the political and economic situation in such-in-such a country and make predictions. Unable to break that habit, I submit the following predictions for the next 120 days in the “Little Republic of Falls Church.”
RED INK UPDATE: To keep this interesting, as each date passes I’ll mark in red ink what actually happened.
Tuesday, March 2: The School Board will vote a “Tier 2” proposed budget totaling $1.1 million ($2.1 million) less than last year’s. The Board will emphasize that the cuts are in spite of an estimated 41 additional students (costing $750,000) expected next year. But because of reductions in state and other non-city revenue, the $1.1 million ($2.1 million) reduction means only $735,000 ($1.3 million) relief to the City’s schools contribution.
Monday, March 8: City Manager Wyatt Shields will submit a proposed overall budget to the City Council recommending a 22 cent (20 cent, but advertise 23 cent) tax increase to the current $1.07, equaling $1.29 ($1.27, but advertise $1.30). Shields will declare that this is the absolute minimum increase the City can enact and still function as a municipality. The 22 cent (20 cent) increase will produce $6.6 million ($6 million) revenue to counteract the anticipated $8.9 million shortfall, leaving $2.3 million ($2.9 million) outstanding, which Shields will propose to divide evenly (not completely evenly) between the City fund and the Schools fund ($1.15 million reduction from each) ($1.3 million from Schools, as proposed by School Board, and remaining $1.6 million from City). This would entail an additional $415,000 reduction (no additional reduction, as School Board already proposed a larger reduction) of the Schools budget.
Shields will further note that the proposed new tax rate means that the “median homeowner” would pay an additional $1,000 ($976) property tax per year, or $2.75 ($2.67) a day. This will inevitably be compared with the cost of a large cup of Starbucks coffee ($2.29 including the 9 percent tax effective in City limits).
Saturdays, March 20 & April 10: Taxpayers and City and Schools employees turning out for the two scheduled Town Hall meetings will speak in opposition to every facet of the budget proposals. Two opposing points will be emphatically made: 1) The tax rate cannot possibly be raised as much as the City Manager has recommended, and 2) neither the Schools nor the City budget can possibly be cut as much as proposed. Staff morale, both at the Schools and the City, will hit a new low.
Mondays, March 22, April 12 & 26: At the three Public Hearings, approximately half of the residents who speak will state that their decision to reside in Falls Church was primarily due to the quality of the schools. The remaining comments will be divided between suggestions for improvements/elimination of the GEORGE bus and improvements/elimination of the City’s garbage collection, recycling, and leaf mulch operations.
Monday, April 26: City Council will adopt a budget with a 23 cent tax rate hike ($1.30 total) — 1 cent higher than the City Manager’s recommendation. It will be noted that the cost of Starbucks coffee has recently risen by the same proportional amount. The extra penny tax revenue will be applied wholly to the Schools shortfall, reducing that amount to $1.215 million. Still, no one will be happy.
Tuesday, May 4: On Election Day, the wisdom of City Council’s unsuccessful effort to postpone the election will be borne out, as three new members are elected to the seven-person Council.
Thursday, July 1: The newly installed City Council will elect a new mayor – the first non-Gardner in 10 years to hold that position. The runoff vote will come down to a contest between an experienced Council member and a newbie. Councilman Lawrence Webb will cast the deciding vote – for a candidate who was elected to Council on a strong pro-schools platform.
Friday, July 2: On the eve of the long holiday weekend, the new City Council will receive a memo from Chief Financial Officer John Tuohy stating that actual revenue for the fiscal year just completed appears to be dangerously less than had been forecast. Further cuts will be required in order to maintain the City’s bond rating.
On the same day, the new School Board (elected without opposition) will be informed by Schools Superintendent Lois Berlin that the latest Fall estimates for kindergarten and 1st-grade students at Mt. Daniel Elementary School exceed the space available. A trailer must be purchased, and additional funds will be required to hire another teacher.
Discussion about the need for a new, $70 million high school will be deferred by the School Board to a later date.
By George Southern
March 1, 2010
Amazing that the city can still find the money to buy new pickup trucks for the schools and public works departments, despite being in the middle of a huge recession. I’ve walked around the property yard on Gordon Road and counted dozens of light trucks sitting there. Now we have expensive crew cab 4WD Hybrid trucks? Does anyone really think we needed to buy an expensive new truck in order to save a few bucks in gas money?
It is this kind of “we need new stuff” mentatlity that pervades this city and its budget. Perhaps our “little city” infrastructure should be scaled back to reflect the realities of our littleness. But no — we get lots of new police cars and pickup trucks every year. Would that I could so indulge.
I might be wondering about the new trucks too. I wonder if they were purchased with funds previously set aside in past budget?
Sounds like a rough 4 months. Maybe I’ll write my 5 year predictions – when we’ll all be feeling better again.
The hybrids down at the Property Yard were purchased through a VDOT grant in 2007 and 2009. Four of the five trucks are assigned to the Water Department – so their fuel and maintenance doesn’t come out of the general City budget.
Just a little more info from the school side…the schools did purchase a Toyota and traded in a truck that barely ran during the cash for clunkers program. In general vehicles are purchased when it is more cost effective than paying mileage rates for personal vehicle use.
What about the new police cars?
A $1,000 average annual increase in real estate taxes is $83.33 a month. The CITY has a financial problem and needs to raise the tax rate. What’s the big deal?
I never heard anybody complain when our home values shot through the roof, much of it to do with the terrific school system. No one complained except the “fixed income” crowd that bought their now half-million dollar homes for $42,500 and don’t want to take a reverse mortgage, so they could leave a pile to their kids.
I don’t know if “120 Days of Little City Predictions” was supposed to be humorous or what, but I was glad to hear that someone is checking the property yard and the police station for excessive spending on vehicles.
Now, more than ever, we need to think carefully about long term, sustainable economic development strategies. It use to be called planning, but it is not too late for the Little City to get a piece of the action that will happen in NVa in the next 4 or 5 years.
Couldn’t agree more, Barry.
What kind of “action” do you have in mind? Hopefully not more school-crowding, traffic-gridlocking, parking-congesting condos and apartments on what little commercially-zoned land is left in the City. And that’s with the total number of units we already have not even close to being fully occupied. The single most useful and productive “long term, sustainable economic development strategy” would be ample municipal parking.
Gerald,
Not sure where you are coming from with your analysis. Two things…..Your $1000 dollar average increase in real estate taxes is on top of an already excessive tax bill. Secondly, I certainly complained when the value of my home ‘went through the roof’ cause guess what……..my tax bill went up. I guess I am completely missing your point.
The magnitude of the tax increase under consideration is, indeed, a very big deal.
Those who take the position that Falls Church is a high income area and, therefore, “we can afford it (an additional $1,000 per year, or more, on top of already high real estate taxes), are missing the point. Even assuming that “we can afford it” as a theoretical matter — a general assumption I would not be so quick or cavalier to make — I suspect that anyone with a spare $1,000-plus probably has any number of financial priorities on which they would prefer or need to spend it, like health care, or groceries, or their kids’ college education, or a savings account to provide a financial cushion for their families in these trying economic times.
Ira Kaylin and Barry Buschow hit the nail on the head when they caution against undertaking now any projects that cause a long-term drain on City coffers, or any projects that are not carefully planned and executed to provide long-term, sustainable economic development. and increased commercial tax revenue.
The proposed affordable housing project does not meet this standard. I am all for providing affordable housing. However, in my view it should be integrated into any and all new residential projects spread throughout the city, rather than densely concentrated in one building — and at that, a tax-revenue-draining building located in the only sizable, commercially developable area of the city.
Here’s the point I was trying to make about the $1,000 ($83.33 a month) real estate tax increase, if that should happen. There are dozens of steps that could be taken to increase revenue from CITY businesses and I’ve talked and written about many of them for the past 20 years. My dream is that some creative steps will be taken that will encourage people to shop, dine, do business and start a business in the CITY.
Meanwhile, for a multitude of reasons, the CITY has a financial problem and, among other steps, needs to raise real estate taxes. I’ve never thought real estate taxes in the CITY were excessive. When you move into the CITY of Falls Church, they throw in a school system almost as good a some of the $2,000 a month private schools in the metro area. So, I don’t think another $83.33 (or whatever the increase) is unreasonable, and it’s better than the terrible service and school budget cuts being tossed around.
Gerald, I know that the City schools have traditionally been a huge factor in maintaining housing prices and, not incidentally but more importantly, turning out some of the best educated, well rounded students in the area. I value that. But the reality is that only about +/- 25% of households in the City have school-age children right now. We should not starve the schools; we must maintain their quality. But City tax policy should also be very sensitive, particularly in the fiscally-strained short term, to the other 75% of households who help pay for them.
Don’t get me wrong — I don’t advocate doing anything that would harm our schools, our students, or their classroom teachers. On the other hand, for all the talk of how much to raise the taxes (and bearing in mind that we “wealthy” Falls Churchers are also taxed heavily at the Federal level), and for all the general talk about cutting the City-side budget, the decisions about how to make cuts seem to be incremental — eliminate a position here or an additional vehicle there — rather than reformist.
Before the City asks me for an additional $1000 or more per year in real estate taxes, I would like to see some fresh, creative, outside-the-box thinking about how to minimize any truly necessary tax increase. For example, could the City reduce duplicative overhead, such as administrative and personnel management functions, between the schools and City side; or could the top management structure of the schools be streamlined without harming the quality of classroom instruction; or, if possible, could the City cede back to the state the convenient but resource-draining automobile licensing and tag/sticker issuing functions; or is there a way, legislative or otherwise, to combine and rationalize the offices of the Commissioner of Revenue and the Treasurer, perhaps even eliminate one of those offices.
I don’t know what the practicalities of undertaking these kinds of reforms would be, and none of these suggestions should be construed as a personal attack on any of the public-spirited, hard-working folks who make this City such a good place to live. I raise these ideas somewhat hypothetically, as examples of what true reform might look like. True reform, rather than incremental budget squeezing, might enable us to keep that extra $1,000 or so and still make that much more tax money available to maintain both our excellent schools and the other benefits of living here.
Gerald, I think my 25%-75% numbers are pretty much correct. I agree,
though, that our fine school system benefits everyone in the City, even those
of us who have never had children in the schools. So you see, now we are
in complete accord!
Linda, I agree with almost everything you say. The City needs to do everything possible to be more efficient and do away with duplication. The City schools might need to do the same, however, the City needs some additional tax dollars, even if every single suggestion you and others have made were to come to pass in the next week. So, I’m hoping we can save as much as possible, raise the tax rate for the coming year, and see what our financial situation is this time next year. If the suggestions for saving money have been implemented, I’m thinking the taxes will be lower.
I don’t agree with your 25% – 75% split of folks who have children in the City schools and those who do not. Your numbers may be correct, but everyone benefits from the terrific school system, and not just in increased home values. My three children are all in their 40′s and did not attend Falls Church City Public Schools. I lived in Arlington during their school years. However, the City of Falls Church is nothing, if it’s not about the schools. There are bad school systems all over the place and the only folks that want to live in those places are people who can’t afford to move or who have enough money to send their kids to a private schools. You move to the City of Falls Church…and we toss in a terrific school system, along with your deed or lease.
George, have you given up updating this piece? I’m at least one person still interested in you continuing to do so.
Thanks!