Arlington County Manager Proposes $1.36B 'Transition Budget'

ARLINGTON, VA — County Manager Mark Schwartz called the Fiscal Year 2022 budget proposal he was submitting Monday to the County Board a "transition budget," one that would move Arlington from a pandemic footing in the direction of a post-pandemic environment. The budget proposal sets aside money for a $17.5 million COVID-19 contingency fund and $500 bonuses for county employees.

"From Fiscal '21, we completely redid our budget, assuming, based on all the revenue drops that we had, that we needed to make some pretty significant changes," Schwartz said, during a Thursday news conference. "Right now, we're hoping that as we move into Fiscal '22, which starts in July, that things will improve a little bit. But having said that, we still needed to make some adjustments and some cuts."

For FY 2022, Schwartz is proposing a total budget of $1.36 billion, with is a 1.4 percent increase ($18.3 million) over FY 2021. For county operations, he is proposing a 1.6 percent increase ($13.1 million) over FY 2021 for a total of $833.9 million. The remaining $529.7 million will go toward funding Arlington Public Schools, which is a 1 percent ($5.1 million) increase over the previous year.

Arlington homeowners will see a flat real estate tax rate of $1.013 per $100 of assessed value if the County Board chooses to adopts Schwartz's proposed budget. Any increase a homeowner will see to their real estate tax will reflect the 5.6 percent increase in residential assessments.

"We have a separate tax rate associated with storm water," Schwartz said "I'm proposing an increase in that to cover the costs associated with debt and for bonds that the voters approved last November for some fairly significant investments to address flooding and stormwater problems that are a legacy of many years in the way we've gone about doing development."

The proposed budget includes a stormwater tax rate increase of $0.013 to $0.017 for $100 of assessed value. That equates to an increase of $0.004 or $29 for the average residential property.

Schwartz does not anticipate having to raise the stormwater tax again next year. Instead, he is working on a plan to move the county away from assessing a tax on property owners toward charging a stormwater fee. The fee would be based on the amount of impervious surfaces people have on their properties.

Schwartz's budget proposal includes $16.4 million in departmental decreases for FY 2022. These include cutting 56 full-time equivalent employees (FTEs) from the budget:

• 10 police officer positions ($940,000)
• 10 deputy sheriffs and records assistant ($1.1 million)
• Reduction of temporary staff in Parks & Recreation ($355,000)
• 1 position each in Behavioral Health, Child & Family Services, and Economic Independence
• Administrative assistant and management and budget specialist from Fire Department ($163,000)
• Probation Counselor ($108,000)

No one will be losing their jobs due to these cuts, according to Schwartz. Arlington County is currently operating under a hiring freeze. The 56 FTEs were vacant because the positions had never been filled or people had taken advantage of voluntary early-retirement packages.

Additional cuts come from staffing adjustments for the county's 9-1-1 dispatch center ($422,000), a change in the roll call process at the Sheriff's Office ($300,000), delayed re-openings of the Cherrydale and Glencarlyn libraries ($881,000), and non-personnel operational savings.

In order to bolster Arlington's response to the pandemic, Schwartz is asking to set aside $17.5 million for a COVID-19 contingency fund. This would help pay for vaccine distribution, testing, and contact tracing. It would also provide funding for emergency rental assistance and eviction prevention, food assistance, and emergency service needs, and support for Arlington's business community. The money would also pay for the purchase of PPEs and clean.

"I'm hoping that we don't need to use that $17.5 million, but that is sort of the biggest thing that you'll see when you look at the budget by way of the spending set aside," he said.

Schwartz's budget also asks the County Board to earmark money to pay for $500 bonuses for county employees.

"Our employees have gone without pay raises for over a year," he said. "Many of them gone have gone without a vacation day for an entire year or a year since the pandemic started and they've been working tirelessly. I was unable, given some of the pressures here, to include more than that $500 bonus."

If Arlington receives additional federal funding from President Biden's proposal that's currently being considered by the House, Schwartz said he would ask the County Board for further compensation for county employees.

The proposed budget also puts money toward recommendations the Police Practices Work Group presented to county on Monday. This includes $125,000 to establish a civilian review board, and $574,000 to pay for a physician's assistant, nurse, clinician, transport van and security supplies.

"That money is set aside for responding to the mental health needs to try to move toward a different model of policing, moving police out of the area of mental health response and making that more of a co-responder model," Schwartz said.

The budget proposal includes additional funding for racial equity training and reallocating a position to support the Chief Race and Equity Officer. Money will also be set aside for Restorative Justice and supplemental funding for the Public Defender's Office and probation and parole.

In the area of housing assistance and affordable housing, the budget seeks to dedicate an additional $2.6 million in housing grants, as well as adding $592,000 to permanent supportive housing choice vouchers.

FY 2022 marks the fourth and final year for the budget implementing Kelly Day staffing for the fire department, which will give firefighters a shorter work week.

Thanks to a financial donation from the Boeing Corporation, Schwartz announced that the county will be opening the Long Bridge Aquatics and Fitness Facility this summer at no additional cost to taxpayers.

"We also have a fully built, completed, ready to go community center at Lubber Run that has been sitting idle for the last five or six months, even after it was completed," he said. "We're reallocating some resources there to open that community center."

Arlington County Budget Timeline: