Coraggio Consulting
Prince William Board of County Supervisors Meeting, Tuesday, February 18, 2025

Date: Tuesday, February 18, 2025
Place: Prince William County Board of County Supervisors, Virginia
Length: 5h 0m (video)
Official meeting video (Prince William County, Granicus): https://pwcgov.granicus.com/player/clip/3601
Official Board of County Supervisors page (Prince William County): https://www.pwcva.gov/department/board-county-supervisors

Machine transcript (speech-to-text) produced by Coraggio Consulting. Not an official county record. Names and numbers may be misspelled; check the video at the timestamp before quoting.
Speech-to-text: whisper.cpp, model large-v3-turbo. Produced 2026-10-30. Timestamps are [HH:MM:SS] into the meeting video.

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[00:29:17] you know what time it is um thank you for joining us today on tuesday february 18th 2025 i just got to double check yeah i got the right date this month is going by please join us um for a moment

[00:29:30] of silence thank you all rise if you are able for pledge of allegiance all righty now we are moving

[00:30:12] on to agenda item number three and that's approval of the minutes may i get a motion so move madam chair second all righty it's been moved and seconded i don't think there's any questions if there is three now forever hold your peace if not let's vote all right we are now

[00:30:47] moving on to agenda item number four accommodations and proclamations um can i get a motion for 4a through 4d so move madam chair second all right any questions comments if not let's go ahead and

[00:31:02] Thank you.

[00:32:22] He retired on December 31st, 2024, as Acting Associate Commissioner of the Administration for Children, ACF, and at the United States Department of Health and Human Services, HHS. Mr. Porter has served the citizens of Prince William County and the Commonwealth of Virginia on many boards, commissions, and community service organizations, including as a Reserve Deputy for the Prince William County Sheriff's Office, as a member of the Prince William County Library Advisory Board, as a vice chair of the Manassas African-American Heritage Festival for more than 30 years.

[00:32:59] As president of the Virginia Association for Human Rights and as a two-term president of the Prince William County NAACP, Curtis continues to serve our community on the Prince William County Historical Commission, as chairman of the Prince William County Human Rights Commission, and as the vice chairman of the trustee board at Little Union Baptist Church in Dumfries, Virginia.

[00:33:23] The Prince William Board of County Supervisors hereby recognizes, congratulates, and commends Mr. Curtis O. Porter on his retirement and extends our deepest thanks for his longstanding and continuous leadership and service to the citizens of Prince William County.

[00:33:52] And Supervisor Bailey, Chair Jefferson, members of the board, it is an honor. Thank you so very much. I just knocked off the mouse, but I'll get it. Thank you so very much.

[00:34:08] But oftentimes people hear about Dr. King. We hear, you know, I've been to the mountaintop. I have a dream. There were a couple other sermons that were very important that he gave. And one that I have tried to live my life by was the one that he gave actually two months to the day before his assassination.

[00:34:30] And it was called the Drum Major Instinct. And to paraphrase, he said that everyone can be great. If you want to honor him for being great for some of the accomplishments, that's good. Everyone can be great and everyone can serve. So I have tried to live my life by being of service to my home community here and to the citizens of the United States of America in my last job in federal service.

[00:34:55] And my thoughts go out to all my former federal colleagues now. And some people say, well, you're retiring now because of the change in administration. No, I was retiring. I worked for five administrations. I was retiring because of this young man right here. So I traded my job for a full-time daycare provider for my grandson.

[00:35:16] So thank you so very much. I'm not retired. I'm a professional grandpa. Thank you. Thank you, sir. Thank you.

[00:35:31] Thank you, sir. I have to get my talk. Do you want to get my talk? I can. Okay, all right. Oh, I'm sorry. Bless your heart. Thank you, sir. Thank you, sir. You're welcome. Okay. Yeah, what's your cap? With my cap on? Yeah. Okay. All right.

[00:35:52] All right, I really went into politics to hold babies because mine's too big to hold.

[00:36:36] All right, now we are on to item 4B, Proclaim February 2025 Benefit Program Specialist Appreciation Month. If the people associated for our benefit program specialists can come stand to the side.

[00:37:09] All right. Thank you, everyone. Prince William County recognizes the importance of providing a level of economic stability by administering federal and state benefit programs to over 140,000 residents, including supplemental nutrition assistance, Medicaid assistance, subsidized child care, long-term care, employment, service programs, and energy assistance. Benefit program specialists continue to experience unprecedented implementation of rapidly changing complex policies and procedures

[00:37:44] in all major benefit programs, as well as continuing changes in service delivery and technology. Prince William County's 216 benefit program staff provide ethical public service adhering to Prince William County's vision and values to ensure that those qualified for federal and state benefit services, receive and continue to receive them.

[00:38:06] The Prince William County Board of Supervisors hereby proclaims February 2025 as Benefits Programs Specialist Appreciation Month. If you would like to say something. Good afternoon, Chair Jefferson, members of the board.

[00:38:27] I am Phyllis Jennings-Hold, and I'm the Director of Social Services. With me today, I have my amazing staff. I have Holly Handing, Acting Deputy Director. Maran Gabber-Medding, the Assistant Director of Public Assistance, Lucia DeToni, the Acting Assistant Director for Customer Support Services, Michelle Henson, Program Manager for Public Assistance, Diane Cunha, Acting Program Manager for Public Assistance, Norma Sanchez, Program Manager for Customer Support Services, and Taboris Miller, Acting Program Manager.

[00:39:00] I am honored to stand before you today to accept the proclamation to acknowledge and celebrate Benefits Program Specialist Month. This recognition is for the dedicated professionals who work tirelessly to support individuals and families to ensure they receive benefits such as TANF, SNAP, Medicaid, child care, employment services, energy assistance, and refugee cash assistance.

[00:39:24] As our county continues to grow, these professionals ensure benefits are provided to approximately 141,000 residents, which is about 28% of the county's population. We have the privilege of making a real impact in people's lives by helping them navigate complex systems, ensuring they receive the support they need, and providing a sense of security during difficult times.

[00:39:48] It's not always easy work, but very important work. Once again, thank you for the proclamation and the recognition, and we will continue to serve our citizens using the county's rec-to-scale values of respect, integrity, creativity, teamwork, excellence, and responsibility.

[00:40:06] Thank you.

[00:40:10] all right we are doing women's history month um if you're associated with women's history month

[00:41:07] please come forward it's just you and me sister all right item 4c proclaim march 2025 is women's history month women of every race class and ethnic background have made historic contributions to the growth and strength of Prince William County, the Commonwealth of Virginia, and our nation in countless ways. Women have played and continue to play a critical economic, cultural, and social role in every sphere and constitute a significant portion of the labor force working

[00:41:43] inside and outside the home, including the majority of the volunteer labor force. The theme for this for Women's History Month in 2025 is Moving Forward Together, Women Educating and Inspiring Generations, which celebrates the collective strength and influence of women who have dedicated their lives to education, mentorship, and leadership, serving as an inspiration for all generations past and present. It is in that spirit that the Prince William Board of County Supervisors hereby proclaims the month of March 2025 as Women's History Month.

[00:42:17] Thank you, Chair Jefferson and members of the Board. As we observe Women's History Month, We pay tribute to the remarkable women who have shattered barriers, transformed industries, and refined possibilities.

[00:42:38] However, this month represents more than just honoring our past. It serves as a rally cry for the future, urging us to unite as we celebrate the women in Prince William County who lead, innovate, and amplify the voices of our workforce and our community.

[00:42:54] Their bravery and perseverance remind us that true progress is forged by those who confront obstacles and uplift others. Let us not only acknowledge their accomplishments, but also recognize the countless unsung heroines in our communities whose strength and creativity inspire change daily. Together, let's recommit to cultivating a world where every woman and girl can flourish. In honoring the past, we are also shaping a fairer tomorrow. Let us make this month a powerful testament to the strength of women's voices then, now, and always. Here's to the strong

[00:43:29] women may we know them may we be them and may we raise them thank you all right and then item 4d

[00:44:04] that is to proclaim march 2025 is irish american heritage month if you guys would join me to the side more than 30 million americans trace their roots to island shores irish americans have played an important role in creating the fabric of our history through their service and government the military and also through their faith and family values. Many Americans of Irish descent continue to play a vital role in shaping our history and culture, enriching all aspects of our lives. We have members of the Ancient Order of Hiberians here with us today. They are America's

[00:44:41] oldest Irish Catholic fraternal organization founded concurrently in the coal mining region of Pennsylvania and in New York City in May 1836. The men and women of the Ancient Order of hiberians are pillars in our community as representatives of their fellow irish americans the prince william board of county supervisors hereby proclaims the month of march 2025 is irish american heritage month and may the luck of the irish be with you thank you chair jefferson and board members i'm vince fitzpatrick many of you have seen me up here for many many years

[00:45:21] accepting these proclamations but uh this year's our 25th year unbelievable we've made it this far and we keep growing we're going to have a wonderful saint patrick's day parade on march 8th in old town manassas uh you're all invited um i have um greg gibbons i'm sorry

[00:45:52] drove a blank greg gibbons he's our secretary i mean our uh our treasurer for in his fail and the holding corporation for the parade but anyhow we appreciate you uh uh recognizing

[00:46:09] Irish history month every year and uh thank you very much we are now moving on to item five our

[00:47:05] consent agenda if anyone has anything they would like to pull off pull out please say it now oh come on no one we're gonna make this easy all right oh supervisor Bailey well I had to be the only one are you pulling it off because you want to vote against it or you want to highlight it because if you don't want to vote against it we'll keep it on and you can you know during discussion time we can talk about it and that's that was my debate let's keep it on okay thank

[00:47:43] you all right seeing as there is no one pulling anything off i'd like to get a motion for 5 a through 5 m so moved madam chair second all right it's been moved to properly second it all right Supervisor Bodie and again if anyone has anything they want to highlight jump in the queue Supervisor Bodie thank you so much Madam Chair just sort of for everyone's benefit 5G this is allocating additional federal funds being granted for the Old Bridge Road Occoquan Road intersection improvement project for folks that aren't sure sure where we sit in

[00:48:21] the timeline for that project now construction will begin starting later this year likely around the fall and will continue until 2026 around summertime um i know that this is a an improvement and a realignment of that intersection a lot of folks have been looking forward to for quite some time i want to thank rick and his team for the continued efforts on this i know it's been a little bit longer than folks would have wanted but it's going to be a major project i know it's going to be timed well especially with the opening of the new rebuilt old bridge or occoquan elementary school thank you so much madam chair supervisor bailey thank you madam chair for your patience. 5i, I just want to highlight that that's a very important county

[00:49:01] land swap with the SALS properties developer for fire station 27th, which was an extraordinarily positive negotiation in land swap. And I really appreciate Matt and his team and the fire team for their indulgence in doing that to make sure their fire station 8 has stood up. And then the next one is 5L that I wanted to highlight. This will give extensive broadband accessibility to that area down by Fuller Heights Park and Fuller Heights Road and also around the Quantico area. So just want to thank the team for

[00:49:39] and Parks and Recs for their due diligence and making sure that that happens as well. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you so much. I don't see anyone else in queue, so let's go ahead and take a vote. Alright, thank you so very much. We are now going on to agenda item number six and that is public comment time. Right now I have one person who has signed up to speak in person. Mr. Lau, you can go to the microphone. You have three minutes

[00:50:10] to speak. State your name and the Magisterial District and where you reside. Thank you, Madam Chair and members of the board. I'm KP Lau from Belmont Bay, Woodbridge. I take no pleasure to inform you today that I have filed a complaint with the Virginia Office of Accomment Interest community ombudsman against the current BBHOA board for violating transparency regulations.

[00:50:44] The Virginia Property Owners Association Act mandates that all HOA to operate in a transparent manner so that the rights of the residents are protected. The complaints relate to two issues.

[00:51:00] One, the board conduct business in the executive session. That is not allowed. And second, The board held a private meeting on December 5th, 24th, with Millen Smith, a developer of Balmain Bay, on land offering without proper advance notice to the residents, and then withheld information from the residents afterwards.

[00:51:30] I first filed a complaint with the board, hoping for acknowledgment and remediation, but receiving no response for more than six weeks. After I filed a complaint with the state, Armand Bussman, the Board finally revealed the details of the meeting with Millen Smith about land offering of small land parcels for Balmong Bay Homeowner Association's support for the rezoning request.

[00:52:02] Supervisor Franklin should remember well that the previous Board of Balmong Bay Homeowner Association in 2021 presented a community development strategic plan to the board in this room. The plan so impressed her that she issued a directive for the planning department staff to host a town hall meeting to follow up with the recommendation. Of course, that resounding request was withdrawn and this plan just set aside. But the plan was valid then

[00:52:39] and Steel Valley today, we will have a town hall meeting tonight at the Belmont Elementary School. Importantly, I want to take this opportunity to say that the real issue in Belmont Bay is the creation of a second HOA by developers to circumvent the input and the interest of the residents, current residents, and that there was no new amenity had been proffered. The legality of the second HOA is questionable, and the planning department has been on record for agreeing with these issues.

[00:53:16] So as the rezoning moves forward, I just want the board and planning department to be apprised of the situation and take residents' concerns into consideration before your final decision. Thank you very much.

[00:53:33] Thank you so very much. I am now going to turn over to Supervisor Bailey for remote public comment time. Thank you, Madam Chair. Are we ready? Is everyone there? I have one person, and that's Ms. Jessica Grove.

[00:53:56] There are no speakers at this time. Okay. Thank you very much. Have a good afternoon. Madam Chair, back to you. All right.

[00:54:12] Thank you so very much. We are going to agenda item number seven, and that is the public hearing, including consolidated land use. Do we, I would like to, hold on. I don't know if we have anyone, but I'm going to go ahead and open the public hearings for items 7A and 7C.

[00:54:34] All right, so I will go ahead now and close the public hearings for items 7A through 7C. I don't know if anyone has anything they would like to pull off. If not, I'm going to go ahead and do, I would like one motion.

[00:54:51] Move for approval, Madam Chair. Second. All right, any discussion on 7A through 7C? All right, let's go ahead and take a vote.

[00:55:13] Unanimous. All right, thank you so very much. We are going on now to agenda item number eight, and that is county executive time. Mr. Shorter, the floor is yours. Thank you very much, Madam Chair. I appreciate that we're moving through the agenda so quickly. You just came to us.

[00:55:29] No, I don't. Say it. No, a few updates. I won't go on too long. Just by way of review, last week the Board established a Board Legislative Committee.

[00:55:45] This was assigned to the Legislative Affairs and Executive Management Office. We have two closed directives since our last meeting. A directive to provide the Board with the needed items to cancel and close out the Route 28 project.

[00:56:02] and a directive to draft the proposed amendment and schedule a public hearing to allow the board to extend the sunset clause for the noise ordinance. By way of legislative update, just as a reminder, we have sent an update to the board on the General Assembly session with a specific emphasis on our bills.

[00:56:25] Those updates will continue to come out, and I just want to remind the board that we are certainly available via legislative liaison for any questions or any additional information you might need. In terms of memos to the board, I wanted to make note of a few items.

[00:56:41] We sent an email to the board regarding the Department of Parks and Recreation preparing to launch its FY26 arts grants program. I just want to make sure that the board is aware and certainly follows up with any questions that you all might have.

[00:56:57] sent an email updating the timeline for the AFDU ordinance and when we will bring that to the board for consideration. And just this morning, I sent an update on the county's comprehensive traffic safety action plan engagement. So the two community meetings that the Department of Transportation will have, one this week on the 20th and one on the 27th to allow the public to provide input. That said, we will be hosting or putting that up on the PwC Works platform. So there will also, in addition to those two public meetings, there will also be an opportunity for

[00:57:37] the public to provide input via PwC Works. That said, if the board approves later on this afternoon with item 11C, the meeting for next week, we do plan to highlight PwC Works in a few, I should say the next tranche of projects that we plan to put on the site.

[00:58:01] We will be talking next week about, and I will, just as I did a few months ago when we launched PWC Works, pull it up so that you all could see sort of online what the website looks like, what new projects we are adding, initiatives we are adding.

[00:58:19] We will talk next week about capital project management improvements. No Wrong Door initiative. The Crisis Receiving Center will be added as an initiative on the platform, and we will also talk about residential and commercial parking as an initiative on the platform.

[00:58:39] We'll also ask for a brief presentation, not a presentation, I shouldn't say, but a review from our directors on the 311 project and the digital transformation projects associated with technology, And we will also have Tanya Washington give an update on zoning, the zoning ordinance update.

[00:59:02] So that all will be on the PWC Works landing page. We will be tracking it as we have with the other initiatives and certainly look forward to any questions or feedback that you might have. And with that, Madam Chair, that is all for me. All right, Supervisor Vega.

[00:59:19] Thank you, Madam Chair. Mr. Schroeder, I just have a small suggestion to make. Super easy. I don't think we need a directive, but if we do, you let me know how we go about it. And considering the fact that Ms. Washington is also here, when my staff and I, and I think my colleagues may share the same, it's not a concern, but request, when we're trying to prepare for land use votes that we have to take, it's a bit challenging having to go back into the system to see how our planning commissioners voted.

[00:59:46] And so my request would be that we add votes listed on the DAPS page for us to make it to make it easier for us to access it without having to have our staff going into the video and replaying it to see how the planning commissioners voted. I will talk with the team and we'll follow up at the next meeting with, well, I'll follow up with you individually if there are concerns, but otherwise I'll report out next meeting.

[01:00:11] Thank you. Supervisor Weir. Thank you, Madam Chair. Mr. Shorter, I shouldn't do this, but I am. I would like for the public's benefit to you, for you to give us a little bit of background on two capital projects given the rather childish behavior by some of our neighboring jurisdictions specifically the route 28 corridor project and the denial of most of the board members and rightfully so fairfax county not knowing about

[01:00:45] the project and then secondly um there have been a number of online posts by several members of Manassas City Council with respect to judicial center expansion, particularly the parking lot, and how we have never informed them of anything. Could you please disabuse the public of the veracity of those statements? Sure. So I sent the board an email, I guess, maybe yesterday or the day before about the judicial center updates. Now, I will say that the FFM team has gone really above

[01:01:22] and beyond over the last few years to make sure that we are in partnership with the city. And so what I sent the board was just a list of the meetings that FFM had with their counterparts in the city of Manassas to update them on the judicial center improvement work.

[01:01:44] I'd also say in that email, I included the fact that FFM did work through Mosley Architects to analyze what the city was interested in by way of the garage location. We did that work.

[01:02:01] I actually personally met with and talked to Pat Pate, the, at the time, city manager in Manassas, to make sure he knew what Mosley Architects came back with and what our position was. He acknowledged that by way of email, and I sent you all the language in that email.

[01:02:19] And so we have absolutely worked very closely. And even most recently, just earlier this month, we had an update from FFM to all the stakeholders associated with the Judicial Center, including the city, just to give an update on the project.

[01:02:36] And so we will continue to do that. I, again, want to really appreciate FFM for doing the work that they do and making sure that all the various stakeholders are up to date. To be clear, the capital costs of this project are borne solely by Prince William County? Yes, that is right.

[01:02:52] Thank you. I do before calling you, Supervisor Anger, I do want to say that we are going to have an inter-jurisditional committee, and that's something, you know, we can delve into further conversation, because I would like to say that Prince William has been a good regional partner.

[01:03:08] And sometimes, you know, there may be some miscommunication, but we could certainly also address that when we have a one-on-one meeting with City of Manassas and Manassas Park. With that, Mr. Angry. And another reason why these positions should be full-time.

[01:03:24] I react. So, Mr. Schroeder, I just want to make sure the board is aware or in the know that I had a discussion with you about our federal employees that live in the Commonwealth. If we could put something together that shows, you know, the support that the challenges that many of them are going through.

[01:03:46] Recognizing that Prince William County has always been known as a bedroom community. Our largest employer has been D.C. We have many residents that work in that area in that field that are going through some challenging times. So it was just asking if there's something we could do to put together a list of services that we could provide to folks that find themselves in challenging situations, unexpected at that point.

[01:04:10] So I just want to put that on the board's radar that I had a discussion with Mr. Shorter about looking into that. Thank you, Supervisor. I really appreciate you mentioning that. I immediately sent a note out to the team after you and I spoke. And we are working this week to put a landing page on our website that provides information for all federal workers who live in Prince William County who are interested in jobs.

[01:04:36] Now, these aren't new services. I will say that these are services that already exist. But job coaching, job opportunities, housing, food assistance, anything that might be of use to federal employees who may have recently lost employment with the federal government, I will say we are certainly hiring in Prince William County.

[01:05:01] And so we will absolutely follow up. I hope next week to be in a position to actually show you the landing page on our website. I've spoken to a few of you about this, and just Supervisor Angry want to thank you for sending me the note and then the conversation about it.

[01:05:21] I don't know if there's anything else for Mr. Charter. It doesn't seem like it, so let's move on to county attorney time. Madam County Attorney, the floor is yours. Thank you, Madam Chair, members of the board.

[01:05:33] This afternoon in closed session, we will have consultation with legal counsel and briefings by staff members pertaining to legal advice regarding the special use permit SUP number 2020-00019, Transformation Temple International Church, state and federal land use law, and the Religious Land Use and Institutional Persons Act of 2000, which is RELUPA, requiring the provision of legal advice where such consultation, discussion, or briefing in an open meeting would adversely affect the bargaining position, negotiating strategy, or litigating posture of the public body. This item is appropriate for closed session pursuant to 2.2-3711A8

[01:06:10] of the Code of Virginia. So moved, Madam Chair. Second. All right, let's take a vote. Did you break it again? No. Vote unanimous. All right, we are moving on to agenda item number 10. Mr. Shorter,

[01:06:48] take it away for agency time. Thank you very much, Madam Chair. Let's see here, get it to the agenda All right, we are going to have a presentation led by planning. This is going to be a discussion, let me see, CPA, regarding the Haymarket Crossing Resolution 10A.

[01:07:14] Director Washington is going to take it. Good afternoon, Madam Chair, members of the board. Tanya Washington, Planning Director. We are here today for a request to initiate comprehensive plan amendment for Haymarket Crossing 3.

[01:07:29] We have Mark McCaskill from our long-range planning division who will lead us through the presentation. Thank you, Madam Chair, members of the board. This is a request to amend the comprehensive plan long-range land use from agriculture and forestry to RN2 in order to support the development of a single-family detached unit active adult community.

[01:08:02] The subject property is at 15450 Heathcote Boulevard, and it's approximately 41 acres. And it directly borders the Haymarket Activity Center. Okay. Let's see then.

[01:08:23] There in that triangle are the 41 acres that the requester is requesting. So it is currently, the current long-range land use is agricultural and forestry, and the request is for residential neighborhood 2 with transect 2.

[01:08:48] The current zoning is A1, and with the application materials that came in, the requester indicated that a concurrent rezoning application would follow initiation and that the concurrent rezoning application would be for mixed-use residential for an active adult housing.

[01:09:12] So staff recommends initiating the comprehensive plan amendment so that staff can further evaluate this comprehensive plan amendment request with regards to conformity to the comprehensive plan. And we do have a note from transportation staff primarily concerning the anticipated concurrent rezoning.

[01:09:34] And this was information that was set out to request her about including pedestrian facilities, provision for interparcel access for emergency vehicles, and the need to follow DCSM and other recommendations during the rezoning and subsequent potential future site and subdivision plan review.

[01:10:00] All right. Any questions? I'm looking over. Mr. Rear? Mr. Bob? Thank you, Madam Chair. In the staff report, there's reference to the Heathcote extension to Antioch.

[01:10:17] Do we know where we stand on the CPA initiation to remove that road segment? Madam Chair, members of the board, Paula Belito with the Department of Transportation.

[01:10:34] As soon as we are, I believe this is in response to a previous directive regarding several roadways. There's been no action since there was a response from the planning office that we coordinated with, and I'll defer to Tanya to the updates on that initiation. We are planning to bring forth the initiation for that CPA in May.

[01:10:53] Thank you. Supervisor Gordy. Thank you, Madam Chair. And just to follow up on Supervisor Weir's question, the Heflin Farm, which is right next door to this parcel, is a family farm that I've been out to, I've visited, And we have worked very diligently to ensure that Heathcote Extension does not bisect their property, which would kill their farm.

[01:11:28] This is a cattle farm. And so this is an area that's been of great concern for me, going all the way back to the comprehensive plan. Powell and I have had lots of conversations about this. But, yeah, that is an area of great concern in just ensuring that that family is not adversely affected by what goes on with this comprehensive plan amendment.

[01:11:51] Thank you, Madam Chair. All right. Thank you. Senator Vazor Vega? I guess at some point I would like for us to talk a little bit about really protecting the agriculture space that we have here in this county.

[01:12:07] When I look at the map and a bigger aerial view, if you will, of this area and the adjacent properties to it, I think that we can make the argument that this is a prime example of urban sprawl. We have an ag and arts district, and, you know, we really don't hear much about utilizing the district that was created to protect land that has been designated as agriculture.

[01:12:31] And so I really don't like this proposal here for the reasons stated. And again, Madam Chair, I think that at some point we have to have this conversation because this opens the door. And if you look at the other properties, they're all zoned A1.

[01:12:48] And so if we move forward with initiating the CPA, one would have to assume that this is going to open the door for other applications to come in to try to change that designation from A1 to similar uses. And so, you know, Supervisor Weir, I'll defer to you because I know that you've put some thought behind this.

[01:13:08] But just want to throw that out there and also for our planning staff to also keep into consideration as we keep getting more of these requests coming in. Supervisor Weir. Thank you, Madam Chair. You're right, Supervisor Vega.

[01:13:24] Unfortunately, in this particular instance, this parcel has gone through any number of rezonings over the years as part of a larger set of rezonings. I believe it was the LJ Clovelly Trust. They've changed it from office to residential.

[01:13:41] That PMR right now is still wooded right now, but that's where apartments are going to go into. And then on the other side of 66, we had the whole fiasco with the Amazon Data Center, so it's ever-changing. What I would suggest in this particular instance is this. because of the layout or the proposed layout that I've seen of this, in addition to the CPA to eliminate the Heathcote extension to Antioch, there will be no way to develop the rest of that A1.

[01:14:10] There won't be the road infrastructure. One of the reasons I believe we can't punch that road through is it would require significant improvements to Antioch Road and probably a new bridge deck over 66. I suggest this will be the ultimate boundary line, and it will make it difficult to progress past that without a county road through there and without anything to handle the additional infrastructure.

[01:14:36] Because if we do plan to, at any point in the future, engage in even further development of the A-1 shown on that map, the infrastructure investment by the county would be massive. tens of millions if not billions of dollars in road schools fire police department and everything else I think this ends up being the firewall. Supervisor Vega. Thank you Madam Chair thank you for uh that supervisor Weir I guess my request uh to be clear for our planning um staff would be that I'd like to see a clear transition from residential to agricultural um and then if if

[01:15:15] you can when you said active adult housing are we talking about age restricting restricted I assume what is um i don't know if the request you know supervisor i don't know if the requester is in to my understanding it's age restricted single family thank you so basically if you're under 55 you're not an active adult is there any other questions i mean i'm sorry but you know the way these things are defined all right well thank you so very much um anything else all right let's go

[01:15:50] ahead and i'd like to i'm looking at you supervisor bob my motion what's the number move 10a madam chair second all right any further discussion all right let's go ahead and vote y'all unanimous all right now we are moving on to supervisor's time before we go around the horn and i'm going to actually do 11g separately i'd like to get a motion for 11a through 11f

[01:16:27] so move madam chair second all right any discussion all right let's vote on the nominations and appointments you had somebody oh no i'm sorry supervisor weir yeah who is she i know her her all right let's go vote unanimous all right thank you so very much now on to 11g okay i'm going to give it some flowers to supervisor bode you know he suggested we can

[01:17:06] incorporate the meeting we missed because it's no one to this day and i was like i don't know man that's gonna be a long meeting but you know what i want to give it to you the way this has been moving you know at a good pace that's okay though it's nice to have a break like a real break. All right. So I'd like to get a motion for 11 G. So moved. Second. All right. Any discussion? I hear some discussion down there. Any discussion? All right. I guess not for the

[01:17:35] group. All right. Let's vote unanimous. All righty then. Thank you so very much. We are going to start with our five minutes apiece. I will start with supervisor. I guess they're talking. All right. Supervisor Bailey. But I started first and last. No, I'm just kidding. Okay. Good afternoon, everyone. Just want to say, first of all, hope you had a great Black History Month month. And I was very excited on the 5th of February to be one of the guest speakers at the Black History Prayer

[01:18:14] Breakfast at Quantico. It was so exciting and the room was filled. So thank you so much for the invitation. On the 6th of February, I was invited by Dr. Bob Snyder from the PRTC organization and Cynthia Johnson, and Holly Morello for the opportunity to serve as the first guest speaker for the OmniRide Mentorship Program.

[01:18:38] The mentees were highly engaged and had lots of questions, and I greatly appreciate their transparency and opportunity to exchange with them. And then on the 7th of February, I was honored that Marine Corps-based Quantico Commander Colonel Jenny Colgate came to the office to talk about the future relationships that we want to proceed with with Quantico, and it was an excellent meeting, and I look forward to her coming to visit us to share that with the rest of the board.

[01:19:08] And then on the 7th of February, I thank Mr. Seth Hendler-Voss. We had a very robust conversation as it relates to the budget and the updates in the district, specifically the updates for Forest Park Golf Club and how it is being revised and moving forward.

[01:19:24] And then on the 7th, also thank you to Supervisor Franklin and Mayor Ernie Porter for giving me the opportunity to visit for a future project at the Ripon Lodge historical site. And that's going to be in collaboration with the Historic Preservation Foundation and the Historic Commission.

[01:19:44] And it was an interesting, interesting discussion and tour. I want to thank the Youth for Tomorrow invitation for the Heart to Heart Gala. And then on the 15th, again, just congratulations to my friend Curtis Porter.

[01:20:02] He works very hard because of the history from his family here in this community. And so we congratulate him for the hard work that he's done in the community and for his retirement and to grandpartum. And then on the 15th also had the opportunity of presenting accommodation to Pastor James Parker III, another stalwart in our community that is very much focused on education and supporting our Dunfords Elementary School and acts for all that he's done.

[01:20:33] We've given him accommodation for his seventh church anniversary. And then on the 17th, had a meeting concerning landscaping with our own Kathy Holzlancer. So I'm looking forward to how the Potomac District is going to be lifted as a phoenix in this community.

[01:20:51] I'm so excited about that. And then on the 23rd, I'll be participating in the Donfrey's Black History Program at Little Union Baptist Church. And then lastly, I wanted to offer, I shared with my colleagues, but I want to offer a directive to staff.

[01:21:08] Without any objections, I would like to direct county staff to prepare the Board's consideration for a resolution to initiate a Fettler Park small area plan to guide the strategic revitalization and redevelopment of this key area in the Potomac District in Prince William County.

[01:21:25] This plan should provide a comprehensive vision addressing land use, zoning, infrastructure, transportation, redevelopment, and economic development opportunities within the Fettler Park area. Additionally, as part of the SAP, staff should explore financial and other incentives that can be used to leverage to support redevelopment and reinvestment in the area.

[01:21:51] Staff should provide an update to the Board of County Supervisors on the progress of this initiative, including key findings and recommendations in a future meeting. When completed, staff should consider the findings of the Fettler Park Area Market Study initiated by the Department of Economic Development and Tourism in preparing this small area plan.

[01:22:13] Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you so very much, Supervisor Weir. Thank you, Madam Chair. I don't have any updates, however. I want to thank the Board. I really do.

[01:22:30] Over the last 18 months, the Board has worked very well together, cooperated. We've been civil with one another. We haven't engaged in bad behavior that I'm aware of, although some might accuse me of it.

[01:22:47] You're so bad. But as most of you know, the last 20 years at least, I've spent a considerable amount of time watching the various legislative sessions in Richmond. And I can say that this year marks the lowest level of childish and heady behavior by the Imperial Clown Show and the governor's office, both sides that I've ever seen.

[01:23:16] And it seems to be trickling down to local government as well, as I mentioned earlier in some comments. And I think what the residents of Prince William County and what the residents of the Commonwealth need to keep in mind is that during this legislative session, A whole bunch of bills have died and will die at the governor's hands that have significant positive impacts for people of all political persuasions in Prince William County and the Commonwealth.

[01:23:49] I don't know how we make this better, but all I can tell you is it's been difficult for this board to get anything done or any traction in Richmond. And I would just suggest to the General Assembly and to the governor's office, they need to do better than this year.

[01:24:07] Thank you. All right. Supervisor Bodie. Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm trying not to seem like a huge contrast to follow that, but I'll just say I wanted to echo some of what my colleague, Senator Bailey, said about Curtis Porter.

[01:24:27] He's spent a lot of years and put a lot of time into public service, into all variety of things in this county. His roots run deep in Prince William County, so I've been blessed to know him over the years and count him as a mentor in a lot of different ways.

[01:24:45] And I just want to just make sure that everyone knows that we continue to honor folks like Curtis Porter. We have a lot of folks in this county who have put a lot of years of service and who have really, really deep roots. And I appreciate some of the directives that this board has put out over the years, including directives that Supervisor Franklin has put out to make sure that we tell the history of our African-American communities and others.

[01:25:07] And, you know, we continue to do better by our history in this county. And I appreciate the county exec, Seth Handler-Voss, you know, all the folks that continue to work on that piece as well. So I just wanted to highlight that. The last thing I'll say is, you know, which was alluded to earlier, we know there's a lot of folks that are facing sort of potential hardships that are currently federal workers, contractors, federally adjacent folks, what have you.

[01:25:34] appreciate the conversation that was had earlier uh by the county exec and sures are angry about us making sure that people know what's out there um because i feel like half the battle that we fight as a board is just making sure people know what's already out there you know we get a lot of folks that come in uh day in day out asking you know hey i'm hitting a rough patch in my life for whatever reason you know what's there what how can you help me and frankly there's still a lot of education needs to be done of the general population around what we offer already um i it's unfortunate it takes events like this and like COVID to really engage folks on what we

[01:26:11] offer as a county but there's just so much that we do as the closest folks the closest body to the people that often gets unseen so I just wanted to highlight that too and again use this as an opportunity to really commend the county exec and his team on the PwC works because I think that'll be another step in the right direction making sure people know hey we're the county government we're the closest to you all we try to provide the services that are going to help you day to day when whatever is going on in federal state is going on we're still here no matter what so wanted to highlight that as well thank you madam chair thank you so very much i'm going to go over

[01:26:45] to supervisor gordy thank you madam chair uh not much uh other than to say thank you to youth for tomorrow um uh was glad to join uh my colleagues uh at their um heart-to-heart banquet uh helping to support the effort there to change the trajectory of lives of young people in Northern Virginia.

[01:27:10] And some of the stories that were told of the lives that have been transformed by Youth for Tomorrow were just absolutely incredible. And so, you know, they are an absolute asset to not just the Brentsville District and Prince William County, but to all of Northern Virginia.

[01:27:27] And so I appreciate the work to continue to recognize them for the hard work and great work that they do there. Tomorrow, as I mentioned during our last supervisor's time, Virginia State University and the Cooperative Extension are hosting a small farm orientation tomorrow at 1 p.m.

[01:27:49] It was to be held at the winery at Sunshine Ridge, but now because of the weather, it's going to just go pure virtual. It was going to be a hybrid event, but now it's just going to go pure virtual. People can still sign up. And, again, this is for anybody who is interested in farming or has just started farming.

[01:28:08] And it can be as small as a backyard farm and just how you can engage in that. They do provide a manual and resources to help you in this journey. So I just want to remind folks about that, and I have nothing else.

[01:28:27] I'll yield back. Thank you. All right. Supervisor Franklin. Sure, yes. I just want to highlight just a couple of things. First of all, I want to thank Congressman Eugene Vindman for visiting with the River Oaks Fire and Rescue Station this morning.

[01:28:43] I had the opportunity to join him and thank our rescue squads for their efforts in helping out with the DCA situation, very unfortunate situation uh over a month ago uh and so just want to thank him for uh his service and thank you for and thank our fire and rescue team at river oaks um for the incredible work that they were able to do also just want to be uh highlight a couple things coming up we have our woodbridge district annual black history month program virtual february 26th we will be highlighting those in public safety and the law that will be virtual and we will announce our

[01:29:19] panelists um very very soon so uh check out our social media and our website for updates as well as our newsletter um and i'll also be partnering with um supervisor bailey again for our annual women's history month program we will release a date for that uh soon and then also i'll i think i'm judging a 4-h contest that was rescheduled so i'll be on deck for that uh very soon and then my office will be hosting a housing roundtable to discuss the upcoming ordinance that we hope

[01:29:52] to vote on this century so just just kidding just kidding chris not really but but but no i mean in all seriousness very important topic we we've been talking about this for years we have been able to make some gains with the housing assistance program that we set up the the affordable housing trust fund that we've been able to fund but we got to get this ordinance off the ground and that will be the pinnacle of of our housing policy here in the county so I'm looking forward

[01:30:26] to having that discussion and with that I yield. All right Supervisor Vega. Thank you Madam Chair congratulations to the ladies who opened up nut and but cakes here in the Coles District off Liberia they originally opened up their first establishment over in the I believe that's you Bob Gainesville district and I am guilty for traveling maybe once or twice a week to go get their sweet treats because they're just so yummy and now I think I'm in trouble because I have them right around the corner so I'm going to try to refrain from going as often as I used to

[01:31:05] So congratulations again to them, and thank you to the Chamber of Commerce for always making these new businesses that are opening up throughout the county feel welcomed, appreciated, and valued. And to the members of the community that showed up, I believe that there was a promotion going on for the first 100 customers that entered the store.

[01:31:23] They'd get a free cupcake, or what do you call it? Yeah, that. and so again congratulations. As stated the 4-H contest was rescheduled so that's going to be happening this Friday starting at 6 p.m. right here at McCourt so if you're able to come join us and lastly Madam Chair I'm going to go ahead and read two directives. I issued one two weeks ago as we had agreed that we would let our colleagues and county staff know ahead of time before issuing a directive. One also has to do with the 28 bypass. This one was an urgent one that we needed

[01:31:58] take action on so the county attorney the county executive madam chair and my colleagues have access to the first one and that is without objection i would like to direct staff to schedule a public hearing regarding parcel b section one walton drive in the coals magisterial district a resident purchased a 2.1852 acre parcel of land at 1411 walton drive manassas with the intention of building a single family home the property is subject to a note on the plat recorded in 1978 which reads this area to be dedicated to public use the minor maintenance such as mowing and removal of debris shall be the responsibility of the homeowners association um madam chair i

[01:32:36] don't think or madam county attorney if i have to keep reading it since i already read this onto the record two weeks ago um do you want me to keep going because it's a lengthy one i think it's sufficient i think the clerk has it and it'll be on the agenda okay thank you thank you and um the second directive has to do with the 28 bypass since the 20 uh since the route 28 bypass is no longer a viable option i would like to direct staff to work with the planning office to prepare a resolution to initiate a comprehensive plan amendment to remove the route 28 bypass from the mobility plan and add the widening of existing route 28 from four to six lanes into the mobility

[01:33:12] plan between the manassas city line and fairfax county line are there any objections okay that is all i have madam chair thank you all right thank you so very much now i do have a directive um there was a door you i'm so sorry i'm just over so miss supervisor angry was so nice bought me some candy today a year later after he said he would know all right so super so so supervisor franklin has some i mean not franklin angry whatever i just i'm piling on today all

[01:33:50] right you you go madam chair real quick because i have some rolling eyes bob it's not in your district it's in supervisor gordy's district so i apologize thank you madam chair that was good uh i'll be quick uh so this saturday um february 22nd streetlight ministry is doing the coldest night of the year walk um if you haven't signed up i don't know i don't know if you're in here you can just show up but we're meeting at the move church at 4 p.m. and that's when the walk kicks

[01:34:27] off and then so we're going to have some refreshments i want to thank amazon web services once again for contributing to actually purchase socks some warm clothing for our population of homeless so that's a big deal if you're around around i hope you join us thursday february 27th I'm attending the 2025 Black History Month program at Hilton Performing Arts Center.

[01:34:51] This event will highlight the rich contribution of culture of African-Americans in our community. And Friday, February 28th, I'm going to be visiting Neopsco Elementary School to participate in their career day once again. That's always a good time.

[01:35:06] I'm going to stay all day as long as I can and just work the rooms. And so Saturday, March 1st, I'm attending the Women's Small Business Expo, hosted by the VFW Post 1503. The event starts at 10 a.m., and I encourage everyone to join me in supporting our incredible women-led small businesses.

[01:35:26] And I'm going to take this opportunity just to recognize this board on Black History Month, because we have five African Americans for the first time in Princeton County's history of this board, So I don't think we give ourselves any recognition of what we represent for our constituents, for the county, for the nation.

[01:35:44] So I want to recognize that milestone on this board for that. I also want to congratulate Saif Rahman, who's going to be the incoming president for MVBIA. There's a ceremony for him this Thursday, if anyone got that invitation in a round.

[01:36:02] So with that, Madam Chair, I will yield the rest of that time, and thank you very much. Oh, really messed up. I'd have skipped on over, Victor. All right. I don't even know where to go. All right. So I will actually see you on the 28th at the career day. That's actually very exciting for me because as a kid, that's something I loved, learning about the different things that different people do. All right. So getting my computer together. I actually want to start with a directive and it's about recreation centers. I actually do work out at one of the county recreation centers and I think it's great and I would like to see it available to more people

[01:36:38] across the county. So with that, the last county-owned and operated recreation center was developed in 1991. Since that time, our population has grown substantially across all magisterial districts, putting a strain on existing facilities, and creating service camps where new demand has emerged. To that end, I would like to issue a directive for staff to provide a cost estimate and funding options to conduct a master plan process, identifying locations where Prince William County might add new community recreation centers countywide with an emphasis in the

[01:37:14] Brentsville District. The scope of work should include assessing community demand, identifying site options, and estimating capital costs and operating costs. This information should be provided to the board in a memo and or presentation at a future board meeting as staff determines appropriate the county attorney's office office is directed to review county staff's information and recommendations for any legal issues all right that's one i'm just checking my time madam chair yes i don't think i i have an objection but then again can you send me a copy so that i can i did

[01:37:50] you know and i'm gonna say i was i was wrong because i was still tinkering the language last minute so i did everyone should have a copy unfortunately it was sent a little late today i sent it but i bcs i thought i bccs everyone if not i will make sure if y'all don't have it i will reason it okay y'all got it um yes i'm doing the meeting i'm shady no i'm not shady i'm forgetful i'm a little flaky sometimes i mean i missed victor angry sitting right next to me all right

[01:38:24] the next thing i want to say is um i would also like to do my notice of intent to reappoint Nancy Beers to the Upper Occoquan Service Authority Board and in terms of a couple activities I'm hosting on Monday so Monday thought it was on a Wednesday all right let me check my count it is on a Wednesday all right Wednesday February 26th at 6 30 at Patti Elementary I am hosting a Montclair

[01:38:56] listening session for all my fellow Monclarians. And on Saturday, March 15th at 6.30 p.m. in the board chambers, I am hosting local government day, which is rescheduled. Unfortunately, I was not able to make that last year, you know, when I had a medical leave. So we are rescheduling that.

[01:39:22] So, information will be going out, and for all middle schoolers, and I'm actually going to, yeah, go back, I'm sorry, Montclair listening session is Wednesday, February 26th. So, I'm very excited about that, and what else do I have? Our new budget committee and finance committee will meet on Tuesday, March 25th, and at that meeting, all board members are welcome to be there.

[01:39:49] We will choose a new chair and co-chair at that meeting. I am not putting myself in the running. So that's an opportunity for one of y'all to tell me what to do. With that, I think I covered everything. Maybe I'll do that. Or try to. I think I got everything.

[01:40:05] So 3.11, y'all. 3.11. All right. I'm going to give everyone 10 minutes. And I do mean 10 minutes. I will come and find you. And then we will be in our closed session. Thank you.

[01:40:43] All right. We don't have anything to report out. We just need to certify. so move out i'm sure second all right let's take a vote unanimous all right thank you so very much

[01:41:17] we have our evening session will begin at seven o'clock so we've got some time between our

[01:41:24] meetings thank you everyone welcome back everyone for the evening edition of our february 18th

[01:43:14] 2025 meeting um we are going to be talking budget but before we do we have one person signed up for public comment time um i believe we don't have anyone online and i wanted to give folks an opportunity to speak before we dive in so i have one person um i will call you up miss amy hermanson and please state your um magic your name full name magisterial district and you have three minutes ma'am good evening thank you my name is amy hermanson and i'm i reside in the

[01:43:51] coals district i have been a resident of prince william county please speak into the microphone we can't hear you so well thank you can you hear me now i can hear you now name's amy hermanson i RESIDE IN THE COALS DISTRICT. I'VE BEEN A RESIDENT OF PRINCE WILLIAM COUNTY FOR MORE THAN 40 YEARS. I'M A LAND OWNER, A TAXPAYER, A CONSTITUENT, AND I VOTE. I AM ALSO A VOLUNTEER WITH BUCK HALL VOLUNTEER FIRE DEPARTMENT, STATION 516. I AM THE IMMEDIATE PAST TREASURER, AND I WORKED IN THAT POSITION FOR THE LAST 18 YEARS.

[01:44:22] I WISH TO SPEAK WITH YOU TONIGHT ABOUT BUCK HALL'S BUDGET, SPECIFICALLY ITS SUB FUND BALANCE. IT IS MY UNDERSTANDING THAT THE far, Chief LaBelle is proposing a policy change that will take our subfund balance. I am asking you to not adopt this policy, at least not immediately. As you know, Buck Hall has allocated budget money from the fire levy. During the entirety of my time as treasurer, it was the policy of Prince William County that any money left at the end of a fiscal year was rolled over into the station's subfund. We were told to think of the subfund as a savings account. Last Wednesday,

[01:44:59] Chief LaBelle had a meeting with Buck Hall's chief and president and informed them that DFR was moving forward with their policy change that would result in Buck Hall losing its subfund balance. This is a major policy change, and it will have serious consequences for Buck Hall, consequences which will directly impact our ability to manage our fire station.

[01:45:21] For example, we need to replace concrete pad around our garage where our apparatus is housed. We have an estimated cost of $400,000. We need to replace the garage doors, eight of them. We have an estimated cost of $250,000. We plan on purchasing a new ambulance, which comes with a two- to three-year lead time, estimated cost $700,000.

[01:45:41] We have projects that are in the works. We have our subfund savings to cover these projects. We have not been derelict in our management duties, and we have been responsible with our money. During the pandemic, we were told not to spend money, and that money was rolled over into our subfund.

[01:45:59] It is a sizable balance right now. We are aware of that. We are still recovering from the pandemic from a fiscal point of view. It takes time to spend money. We must and we do comply with county purchasing regulations. It is a slow process.

[01:46:15] And that means we need time to get our projects going. We need time to comply with purchasing regulations. And we need time to come to you, the Board of Supervisors, to ask permission to spend our subfund because we will be spending outside of the normal budgeting process.

[01:46:31] What we do as fire and rescue is important, and we need to always be ready when the call comes in. If Buck Hall loses its subfund, it is going to compromise our readiness going forward. We understand that we are part of the whole system, and we support that.

[01:46:48] We have always been known to work well with the county. But taking our subfund money will damage Buck Hall, which in turn damages the whole system. And taking our sub-fund money does not solve any system-wide problem. The damage outweighs the perceived benefit.

[01:47:06] I apologize, but the three minutes are up. I appreciate you. Thank you. Thank you. All right. We do not have anyone else for public comment time. And again, ma'am, thank you. And if you, I don't know how late you want to be here, but I can talk to you afterwards.

[01:47:24] It's going to be a long meeting. Thank you. All right. We are on to agenda item 13. and we have a presentation from our um county executive mr shorter the floor is yours awesome and while you're pulling off i just want to let everyone know um you know we're going to hold all questions towards the end and we all got our budget books i'm just saying be careful where

[01:47:56] you leave them because you know some of us like to have extras we ain't tearing stuff up all right i'm just saying if you if you if there's a missing budget book that's you on you all right Good evening, Madam Chair. Good evening, board members. Chris Shorter, your county exec.

[01:48:21] Quite an honor to be able to stand before you tonight and to be able to speak to what has been a very long process. We have started in earnest on this FY26 budget since August. And to that end, I really just want to start out by thanking the leadership team.

[01:48:45] Many of our leaders, department directors, chiefs, others are in the atrium. They have done just a phenomenal job getting us to this point in the process. With guidance that came out in August, they have just been working really around the clock to make sure that we get to this point in the process.

[01:49:08] I also want to just acknowledge Dave Sinclair and the entire budget team. They have really been working hard over the last few months. We, meaning me and the cabinet, have been meeting with them every morning for the last few months to get prepared for this day.

[01:49:28] Now, I know that this is the start of the public process and the start of our discussions, so just want to really also appreciate each of you. I know we as a team got an opportunity to sit down with you just a few weeks ago as we prepared for this evening and want to appreciate your time up to this point, fully understanding that we have some significant work to do and that this is the start of the public process.

[01:49:54] All right. This budget certainly meets the local and state statutory requirements of our budget, and that is to say we are fully balanced, as you will see in the coming slides.

[01:50:11] This budget also meets the policy and principles of sound financial management that the Board has so strongly supported over the years. And so we are excited about what we are presenting here this evening. I will tell you that this presentation is structured to start really where we left off last year.

[01:50:33] So we're going to start with the FY25 budget and a review of the revenue and expenditures. We're going to talk about the FY26 budget, if you will, the revenue expenditures, the budget overview for FY26. We'll talk budget priorities as we have seen them and as you will see them in this presentation.

[01:50:53] And then we'll talk about the decisions in FY26 that the board has already made that has sort of undergirded the decisions that we are making and recommendations we're making to you. So that said, we will go ahead and get started with the FY25 budget overview board.

[01:51:11] You will recall the board's very bold action last year in reducing the overall tax rate for residential, for property taxes by 4.6 cents. A big deal to move from 96.6 to 92 cents.

[01:51:30] We also, board, saw you approve an increase to our personal property tax, computer and peripheral, from $2.15 to $3.70. All right. Big decisions. Those decisions combined with a few others brought us to a general revenue increase of one hundred and eighty three point six million dollars.

[01:51:54] That is significant growth and a very big deal for our county. Thirteen percent growth and especially important, given that we almost that we reduced the property tax by almost five cents. All right. So we are in a great position, I should say, as a county in terms of seeing.

[01:52:12] that kind of growth given what we did and after i'm sorry we're going to question after our presentation yeah and and madam chair i'm happy to kind of because we are we are breaking it up when we do budget initiatives we're breaking it up into functional area or strategic plan area happy to take questions for each of the functional areas if it's easier for you and the board looking over there i know you got a lot of questions i know you're ready um i think it might be easier to go through the entirety of the presentation and then ask her questions because

[01:52:52] you know something may lead to another question very good so in terms of the decisions made last year the additional revenue the 13 increase we use that revenue and you will see here on this next slide expenditures right and so we use that revenue and the expenditures for that revenue to first, do what we always do, and that's to make sure that we are in line with the county school's revenue share agreement.

[01:53:22] And so you see the split between where the counties receive that additional revenue and what we did with the additional revenue, the $58.6 million, we use $29 million of that to support staff salaries and benefits. You see in this table at the bottom of the slide what we did by way of market adjustments for staff.

[01:53:42] So if I point to and you take a look at the FY25 budget, that is where the board was last year by way of market adjustments for staff. I'd also highlight that the Board made a big commitment last year to our collective bargaining agreements, ratifying the agreement in January of last year and the agreement coming into full enactment, if you will, in July of last year, July 1st of last year.

[01:54:14] We also saw an investment in the housing trust reserve, and the table on the right of this slide shows the commitment that the board has already made and has made in years ahead to support the housing trust reserve.

[01:54:32] I'm calling it reserve because it is not yet a trust, as we are working very closely, obviously, with you all to bring forward the ordinance that will hopefully get us to a place where we actually have a trust and we can call it trust. And then also wanted to pull out the investments that the board made last year in terms of capital and capital projects.

[01:54:55] We doubled, we supported or saw significant support for parks and recreation programs and facilities. We saw investments in pedestrian and mobility safety last year. And then obviously increases in support for, increases in staffing and support for our capital program generally.

[01:55:15] All right, moving ahead from FY25 to FY26 in terms of a budget overview. So let me say, by way of revenue, $1.99 billion revenue picture here.

[01:55:39] This pie chart shows where we are in terms of where the sources of that revenue is coming from, and you can see by and large that the largest source of revenue is coming from our property taxes. Consistent with the balanced budget, you see the expenditure pie chart.

[01:55:58] This is essentially where the larger swaths of funding is going by way of expenditure. And the largest part of that pie is transfers out of the general fund into our schools in ADC.

[01:56:13] A whopping 55% of the expenditure budget is going to transfers. Now, I like this slide. We show it every year. This is the slide that really lays out where the funding is going based on our strategic plan goals, where the funding is going, and how many FTEs are associated with those particular functional areas.

[01:56:43] It's important here, well, I like it so much because everyone is shown, everyone is included, all of the agencies, including our partners, constitutional officers and courts, and our schools, all right? This is really, I hope to come back to the slide if there are any questions about kind of where this funding is going and what this represents, but I appreciate that the budget team puts it together in this way.

[01:57:12] Okay, now moving on to budget priorities, this is where we believe that the board is Certainly based on what we have heard from you throughout the last calendar year, what we will be talking about next week in terms of the strategic plan draft that we will be bringing to the board for adoption next week, hopefully.

[01:57:36] This budget certainly speaks to your priorities in the things that we have heard from the board. I know I have said many times to you all individually, and I've said publicly, the need to invest in staff and technology infrastructure.

[01:57:54] You will see that really throughout this budget. We are a growing county with growing expectations, and we have to be the kind of government that can meet the needs of our growing county. And so with that, you will see significant investments here being recommended for staff capacity and for investments in technology and technology infrastructure.

[01:58:17] We are also, as has been stated many times in this room, committed to making sure that we successfully open the crisis receiving center. And so you will see an investment in the crisis receiving center as well. And then we are doubling down on the investment and maintenance for our parks and recreation system.

[01:58:38] And we will also be consistent with the school, the county school revenue share. All right. And so moving into the the FY 26 budget. So we are we are wanting to start, as we always do, with where the board has already made decisions.

[01:59:00] And we know where those decisions lead us. So for collective bargaining, we know that for the FY26 budget that we have already committed $8.3 million by way of the collective bargaining agreements.

[01:59:16] This includes both staffing and the salary adjustments. We'll talk more about that as we go in terms of what that means for market adjustments and salary and what it means in terms of the additional FTEs that will be included.

[01:59:32] The board also provided last year direction to purchase two properties, Rawlings Farm and Ned Distiller House, and this includes the maintenance and operation for those two properties.

[01:59:49] You may recall that the board also directed staff to or approved the bringing in-house, the pharmacy and pharmaceutical program, I should say the pharmacy program from Fire and Rescue, We are now well on our way and ahead of many other jurisdictions in terms of making sure that we are providing for pharmacy, the pharmacy program and our needs here in the county.

[02:00:19] We are also including one-time data center litigation costs of $600,000 to provide additional support there. and the contingency fund, consistent with our principles of sound financial management, including $1.5 million based on the board's decision last year.

[02:00:38] And just a few weeks ago, the board decided to enact or establish the board committees here in February, and this is consistent with the decision there. So we are starting out the FY26 budget with these decisions in mind as we make additional recommendations.

[02:01:00] And so with compensation for FY26, we are recommending, I'm recommending that we include a 3% step in merit increase. Now, to be clear, I think I said it last year, when we use the term step, we are referring to our public safety personnel.

[02:01:20] And when we use the term merit, we're referring to our government, general government workforce. And so we are contemplating an across-the-board 3% increase for our workforce. This includes also a recommendation for a $3.4 million investment in health and dental, and then a $100,000 investment to right-size our retiree health.

[02:01:47] In terms of collective bargaining, back to the prior slide, what we are including in this budget for collective bargaining by way of compensation continues what we did last year. And that was a two-year, essentially, commitment for police and for fire. For fire and rescue, that is the 1.25% market adjustment. And for police, a one-time bonus, just like last year, of $1,000. And we'll talk a bit more about what that means,

[02:02:21] but for the wage re-opener, that's going to happen this spring as well. All right, moving on. Now, For the sheriff and for ADC, as you can see on this slide, what we did this year is what we promised we would do at the end of last year's budget and what you funded, and that is conduct a compensation study for both the sheriff and for ADC.

[02:02:43] The results of that compensation study has certainly gone into the recommendation that you see here this evening. So in terms of compensation for the sheriff, we are recommending $600,000. This will cover the 1.25% market adjustment that we're recommending for the sheriff's office.

[02:03:04] It will also cover a 3% step increase consistent with what we're doing throughout the public safety quadrant. We are also including, and this was identified by the sheriff last year, and sort of validated, if you will, with the compensation study, there is a slight adjustment that needs to be made at the captain's rank to ensure proper differential.

[02:03:31] And so we are moving from 14% to 16% captains within the sheriff's office. Now, you may sort of refer back to the table that I started with in that if we account for the market adjustments that we have made over the last several years from FY23 to present with this proposed budget, we are looking at a cumulative market adjustment for the Sheriff's Office of 21.97%.

[02:04:00] This does not include the step increases that we have enjoyed thanks to the board's support over the last several years. For ADC, we are recommending a $4 million investment in ADC to bring them up to a place where they are competitive with our neighbors.

[02:04:21] We are including for ADC also a step increase consistent with what we're doing for everyone else. What we saw in that compensation study, depending on where you fall at ADC, your rank in years of service, We are recommending a 5.7, between 5.7 and 9.3% increase for ADC personnel, for ADC workforce.

[02:04:47] This will work through, again, based on the board's approval with employee by employee through HR. For ADC, similar to the sheriff, when accounting for year over year the market rate adjustments, ADC is between 21.97% and 25.59% over the FY23 to present in terms of the adjustments that have been made.

[02:05:18] So big investments and critically important based on the commitment to do compensation studies. Now, that said, we are scheduled this spring to complete compensation studies for both police and for fire and rescue.

[02:05:40] Those compensation studies will not impact this particular budget. So we are not expecting that in FY26, we will be dealing with another set of compensation studies outside of ADC and Sheriff. What we are expecting is that the compensation studies, the results of those compensation studies, we will get this spring.

[02:06:00] They will absolutely have an impact on the wage reopener negotiations that we expect to also start this spring, but that we will be coming back to the board in FY27 with the actual impact in our recommendation based on those compensation studies.

[02:06:15] I'll also say that we are, based again on what we committed to last year, We're going to be doing a classification and compensation study for our general government, so our general workforce as well. Don't expect for that to have an impact on the FY26 budget.

[02:06:33] I do expect to be coming back to the board in FY27 with the impact based on that analysis. All right. Okay. So moving on to budget initiatives. And, again, this part of the slide deck is broken out by strategic goal area, starting with education and workforce development.

[02:06:57] So consistent with the school, the county school revenue share, what you see here is a significant investment in our schools. I have heard it from you collectively as a board, the importance of funding public education, and we are certainly doing it here.

[02:07:17] We are now last year, FY25, you may recall me standing here and saying that this, That transfer represented the largest transfer in the history of our revenue sharing agreement with the schools. This year, we are increasing that by $82.5 million.

[02:07:38] This is a 9.1% increase, and ultimately, in addition to the $82.5 million, we are also recommending we maintain the class size grant, the debt service to Gainesville High School, We're recommending that we maintain cable grant revenue, the school security program, and our investment in Northern Virginia Community College.

[02:08:04] The $1.2 million to support early college programs and the workforce development programs. This all in all gets us close to a billion dollar investment in education. No one can say Prince William County isn't investing in education. All right. All right. Moving on to safe and secure community.

[02:08:29] We are recommending a $6.9 million investment in PD. This includes 20 sworn and three professional staff for PD. We also recommend, consistent with what we just talked about in terms of the collective bargaining investment, $6.5 million for fire and rescue.

[02:08:50] That is to continue the investment in the 30 FTEs that we started last year. And so our goal is to get to 90 FTEs, as we've discussed earlier. one-on-one and even publicly. In terms of public safety resiliency or resilience, the Public Safety Resilience Center, we're recommending a $400,000 investment. This supports the ongoing counseling, behavioral health services that we provide really across the board within the public safety quadrant. This includes volunteers and their families. We are also

[02:09:28] recommending $300,000 investment in the Office of Public Safety Communications. This is a growing County, and that means we are getting more calls into our 911 call center. And so this is really the start of a staffing plan that we are anticipating, a three-year staffing plan that we're anticipating, and the support is certainly needed in our Office of Public Safety Communications.

[02:09:51] In our Office of Community Safety, we're also recommending a $300,000 increase in funding to support community violence and domestic violence programming. Continuing with Safe and Secure community. We are also, and I know I've talked to you all individually about the Commonwealth Attorney. We're recommending an investment of $1.2 million in the Commonwealth Attorney's Office.

[02:10:22] When counting the entire staffing plan associated with the Commonwealth Attorney, from FY22 to present, we have sent 40 FTEs. We understand that this is the end of this staffing plan and that we will certainly be coming back to you next year in FY27 with an additional recommendation on continued support for the Commonwealth Attorney. But this is what we're recommending for FY27. For the Sheriff's Office, we're recommending a $1 million investment.

[02:10:57] This includes support for what we believe will be a sixth general district court judge that is making its way through but we have confidence that this will happen here in Prince William County and we want to make sure that we are able to support to support the judge through the sheriff's office. We're also including in that investment additional support for the Judicial Center Security Program. In CJS we are recommending a $300,000 investment in court order domestic violence. This is a domestic violence coordinator that is associated with CJS, but court ordered

[02:11:37] by our judges, and also an additional component to the investigations team. As I mentioned, the general district's sixth judge, you all know that the state pays for the judge. We would be responsible for paying for the support for the judge, and so that's what you see here. Two additional clerks to support the judge in the case that the judge has approved.

[02:12:08] We're also recommending an investment of $200,000 in the circuit court operations, juror operations, leaving a safe and secure community and going to mobility, economic growth, and resiliency. First up is our planning office. We are recommending $800,000 to support our planning office. This is to support small area plans to address the backlog. Now you all know

[02:12:42] board members that we are sending a lot of directives to the planning office and we want to make sure that we are able to support those. This by no means covers all that they are expected to do but this is certainly the continued investment is certainly helpful. We are going to talk a bit later about a Q&A session with the board where we could talk directly to Director Washington about some of the work that she's been doing to support the planning office, and so looking forward to those questions. This investment supports the small area plans, it supports long

[02:13:21] range planning, and it also supports additional costs associated with advertising increases and some staff training and development that the director is interested in. We're also including $200,000 to support a transportation deputy director. This is not going to be general fund supported. This position is going to be supported by the over-billion-dollar capital program that transportation manages, as well as recordation tax. So 50% from the capital program

[02:13:54] and 50% from recordation tax revenue. We're including $300,000 to support the economic Development Department's Marketing Promotions Manager. This also includes an investment in the Metro Washington Airports Authority. I understand their representatives got to each of you in terms of your offices and talked about the benefits of membership, and so we've included a provision for membership here as well. We're including $200,000 to support Target Industry Plan Review at Public

[02:14:31] works, and $100,000 to support development services, zoning administration, SUP, and non-conforming use validation support. Continuing with mobility, we have $300,000 included for tourism.

[02:14:51] This supports, and this also is not going to hit the general fund. This is using TOT dollars. We would be supporting a public relations firm to help with all the work that they do to bring in visitors, to increase brand around the amenities that we have here in the county, and to bring visitors to those amenities. Many of you, well, you all know we've talked privately about Americans at wartime. I am certainly sensitive to the fact that the state

[02:15:24] has placed money with a match in the state budget. We are hopeful that we will be able to bring this back at recap, but I did not feel comfortable given the ongoing discussions that we are having with the representatives at Americans at Wartime Museum. We didn't feel comfortable putting it in the proposed. I did, however, list where we would be sourcing the funds to pay for the $2.5 million if we are able to bring it back during budget recap. And I'm happy to kind of

[02:16:01] answer any questions about that if those questions come. Continuing with mobility, the OmniRide local subsidy, we are recommending that we fully fund the OmniRide request, but you will see from this slide that we are not recommending that we use general fund dollars to support that request.

[02:16:23] We are, in terms of source of funding, using motor fuels tax, motor fuels fund balance, Branner's Tax for Mobility and TOT for Mobility. I have heard from you all collectively that public transportation is critically important for our county, and it absolutely is. And we know that we ultimately need to talk about sustaining our investment in OmniRod and how we do that. So look forward to that discussion as that discussion will certainly come. We also include

[02:17:00] $5.8 million investment to maintain the VRE local subsidy using NVTA, $30%. And we are including an increase in the trip funds for each of your offices. This is sourced with a recordation tax.

[02:17:19] And so you could see here we would be increasing the trip fund from $225,000 to $450,000. These are very important transportation projects that your offices manage. We manage over 150 orphan roads here in Prince William County and need funding to continue to maintain those roads.

[02:17:41] Now, obviously, we transfer these roads to the state often throughout the year, but we still need to support the maintenance for those roads. And so this funding certainly does that moving on.

[02:17:58] And finally, with mobility, we've talked and heard from you that we need to take a very thoughtful look at the landfill operations. And so we have done just that. I appreciate the staff's creativity here and that we are proposing that we open the landfill for the seven days that we have talked about in this room several times.

[02:18:24] We are not requesting that we increase the staffing associated with the landfill. Instead, what we are recommending based on the staff's review is that we shift the schedule. And so what you see here in this table is where we currently are and where we would go if the board approves this in a few weeks.

[02:18:48] That said, we would be asking for one additional FTE and a $300,000 investment to support a scale house operator and some differential pay for employees for Sunday and Saturday work.

[02:19:05] We are asking for lead time, lead time to notify the industry, haulers, and others that will be impacted, as well as to make sure that we can recruit in the case where we need to recruit staff. We are not recommending this year a solid waste fee increase to do this.

[02:19:24] We will, however, likely in the years ahead be recommending some change, but not, again, not this year. Leaving mobility and going to health, well-being, and environmental sustainability.

[02:19:43] So we are starting this particular strategic area goal with the CRC. And so I think we have been very clear about where we are with the CRC. This is a one-time $5.7 million investment.

[02:19:59] We believe that we will be in a position during FY26 to have some level of confidence and at least awareness on whether we're going to need to come back to the board in FY27. But for our purposes this year, this $5.7 million will give us what we need to open the CRC and to fund the CRC's operation.

[02:20:22] We suspect that this waiver process will take about 18 to 24 months, and we are in that process now. So we started the waiver process a few months ago. I believe the application went in back in December.

[02:20:39] And so we have a little while to go, but certainly this investment would give us what we need to open with confidence later this year. In terms of developmental disability services and early intervention services, this is federally mandated, and therefore we get support from the state to provide these services.

[02:21:04] You can see on the bottom of this slide, we are providing $200,000 to support these services, and the state contributes $300,000, $500,000 increase for FY26. Very important, critically important mandated federal services for young people with developmental disabilities.

[02:21:30] Continuing with health and well-being, homeless services, we are recommending a $500,000 investment in homeless services that supports street outreach, coordinated entry, and what we do by way of hypothermia services during the winter season.

[02:21:48] Very important investments with a lot to do for this team. I will tell you that this investment will mean a lot to the homeless services team. Public assistance with DSS, well overdue.

[02:22:06] This is a very important and big investment, $600,000. As you could see, also a contribution from the state with this investment in public assistance. What we have here is a table that actually lays out some of the increases that we have seen in the applications for public assistance and what the staff have had to absorb.

[02:22:30] And so you could see very directly why the need. And this is also supported by the state with a $500,000 commitment from the state and a $600,000 commitment from the county with a total $1.1 million investment in DSS.

[02:22:48] In terms of our affordable housing and dwelling unit office, this is the completion of a two-year staffing plan for this new office.

[02:23:04] Happy to say that the Office of Housing and Community Development is well on their way in terms of recruiting. Last year's investment in FTEs, and this certainly completes that investment. It's important to all of us that housing and community development is in the position to do what we'll be asking them to do over the next few years.

[02:23:28] We talked about the investment in the housing trust reserve. That is certainly listed here as well. In terms of seniors without walls, $300,000 investment in our area agency on aging, critically important need.

[02:23:46] You all may know this, our senior population has increased 400% over the last two decades. And so the need for us to bring services to our seniors, whether it be recreation centers, libraries, or wherever they are, is critically important, and this investment will do that.

[02:24:07] We are also recommending a $200,000 investment in our libraries. This is an investment that will have an impact on all 12 branches, and libraries certainly will be available to talk about that investment and what it would mean in the system.

[02:24:23] We are also recommending a $100,000 investment in social services fatherhood initiative. This program would support formal referrals from social services as well as programming within the ADC. We are also recommending a $100,000 investment in youth services.

[02:24:47] This is to meet state mandates, federal mandates around employee-to-youth ratios. And you could see a contribution from the state. Actually, the state is contributing $300,000 to our $100,000 for a $400,000 investment in youth services.

[02:25:09] A very important investment. In terms of public health and community outreach, at no additional cost to the general fund, these are five FTEs that were established really to support what would have been a local health department.

[02:25:26] We are now transferring those positions to the Prince William County Health Department to support our county. I'm happy to answer questions about that. we set with the Public Health Department a few months back, and this is certainly a much-needed investment that I'm sure they are happy to talk about if needed. Okay. In terms of parks maintenance, so we talked about this at the start of the presentation in terms of the investments that the board made last year in FY25, and we are doubling down in FY26. This is important as we

[02:26:06] are bringing new projects, have brought new projects online or projects that will be completed in FY26, we are incorporating ahead of time maintenance to keep those projects well maintained as they are coming online. And so these FTEs and the funding associated would support the maintenance for these various projects. We are also recommending that we provide an additional $100,000. This is completely user-fee supported to support two-and-a-half FTEs,

[02:26:43] to support our indoor rentals at gymnasiums, historic preservation programming for schools, and to support the expansion of the dance program at Dell City Recreation Center. Again, fully fee-supported and not programming that would hit our general fund. Continuing with health and Well-Being, our Office of Sustainability, we are recommending $300,000 increase to support a green

[02:27:14] buildings manager and a climate and resilience manager within sustainability, and $500,000 to support all the work that we're doing around the MS4 permit. This is all of the Clean Water Act activities. This is the Flood Resiliency Program, and this is to support an additional FTE environmental analysts within public works. We are also including a stormwater fee increase of

[02:27:48] about approximately 3%, and you can see here this table shows you essentially what that increase would look like, $1.57 for a single-family home by way of change from last year's adopted to this year's proposed. Moving on to government operations, we are recommending a $2.4 million investment in our elections equipment. This equipment is replaced every 10 years, and we are at that point, and I think we're being joined by some of our surrounding jurisdictions in the

[02:28:26] purchase of updated voting equipment. This will certainly be much more user-friendly. I will tell you that I believe that the equipment now allows for you to actually see the results of your voting as you leave the voting office, where you make your ballot.

[02:28:48] I'm not saying that correctly, but it is a lot more user-friendly. They demonstrated kind of the new technology to us a few months ago. This is not going to be general fund supported, but instead funding that we pull from the capital reserve. Now, we're going to talk about other capital reserve, other funding that we pull from the capital reserve as we go through the rest of this presentation and certainly next week as we talk CIP. And so certainly a strategic conversation and a strategic investment in terms of what we take from capital reserve versus what we take

[02:29:27] from general fund. We are also asking that the board approve a $700,000 investment in our financial systems and data analytics teams. These are teams that are currently made up of temporary staff, and this is absolutely a permanent activity. These teams support Mobius, which is essentially our financial reporting system. It supports our entire enterprise, and we need a permanent team to provide for the financial reporting and activity around this work.

[02:30:03] In terms of tax compliance, we are asking for an investment of $400,000. This is to support compliance around the food and beverage tax, reduced delinquencies.

[02:30:22] This funding is also totally agency revenue supported. Continuing with government operations, human resources, we are recommending a $1 million investment in human resources.

[02:30:39] This is to support the new approach, really, to supporting our agencies in terms of human resource management. We are also going to be supporting the summer internship program, which I had an opportunity to talk about and highlight at the state of the county address, you all may recall.

[02:30:58] We are also going to be supporting additional activities and work around recruitment and outreach and advertising for job and job opportunities in the county. Big investment in HR, much needed, and will certainly help our agencies as they are looking for more of a business partner in HR.

[02:31:18] We're also recommending that we include a $500,000 investment to establish a performance management program within the county. We are certainly of size now and should be able to report out on KPIs. So next week we'll be talking about the strategic plan and asking the board to adopt the strategic plan.

[02:31:37] As part of that strategic plan, we will be working towards creating KPIs that we want to be in a position to report out to our community, to our county, and to you. We will also, in addition to KPIs for our strategic plan, be looking to create performance plans for all of our agencies and follow very clear sort of performance standards.

[02:32:03] In terms of communications, $300,000 investment to support language access coordination and to support a deputy director in the communications office. And the procurement office is supporting, well, we are asking for your support for the procurement office to use $300,000.

[02:32:26] Again, revenue supported through the P-Card rebate program, additional FTEs for contract compliance work and some of the other work, internal control work that the procurement team does.

[02:32:41] Again, not going to hit the general fund. I think this is a very creative way. We asked for our agencies to be creative, and this is certainly a creative way to use revenue received from the PCARB program. In terms of critical needs, we are now moving from government operations to more kind of cross-the-enterprise needs.

[02:33:06] We are recommending $3 million for the PD to replace vehicles, 35 police vehicles, this money, and to provide $500,000, as you could see, for the insurance program.

[02:33:25] This is sort of a rebate, not rebate, a deductible, if you will, in terms of insurance. This funding is being also pulled from Capital Reserve and not from our general fund. In terms of workers' compensation and property insurance, we're recommending an $800,000 investment to support workers' compensation and an FTE, a risk and wellness specialist. $700,000 to support the social services CSA program,

[02:33:59] mandated service, and one that is based on utilization. The state helps us with this program as well. As you can see at the bottom of this slide, the state will be contributing $1.3 million while the county is contributing $700,000. A big commitment from the state on this mandated service. In terms of our contractual obligations, we are asking that the board provide support for $300,000 increase in custodial and waste management services, pool chemicals, and our

[02:34:39] external auditing services. We are also including $200,000 here for the support Birmingham Green agreement and the membership associated with Metropolitan Washington COG.

[02:35:04] Here on this slide is a list of many of the technology investments that we would define as critical for our county. And so what you see on this slide is contracts that we are recommending we receive an increase on technology services under the Improvement Program section.

[02:35:32] And then we're recommending a use of fund balance for the CAMA and radio frequency ID. Now, we are going to talk in a few slides about the budget work session schedule. And this will certainly be one of those budget work sessions.

[02:35:51] We know that this is a significant investment. $7.6 million, but this is a very critical investment. And so look forward to having, well, certainly answering questions this evening, but having Rob come and talk a bit about the technology investments and their needs.

[02:36:12] That said, in addition to these contract investments and system investments, we are also recommending, and this is mostly because we are just behind on the investment, critical investments in our cybersecurity and firewalls, investments in network infrastructure.

[02:36:33] And we are recommending that we not fall behind in the way that we have. And so we are recommending a five-year investment program for technology. And you could see that here on this slide, what we would be recommending for FY26 proposed and as we go forward.

[02:36:55] In terms of capital projects, we've talked a lot about the Judicial Center. In the expansion work that is happening there, we are recommending that we provide $500,000 cost recovered from that project to support three additional FTEs and making sure that that project is managed properly and moves according to schedule.

[02:37:20] Board, I've talked to each of you about reclassifying a deputy transportation and capital construction position. This we would do really in line with the board's support if the board moves in this direction based on my recommendation this year.

[02:37:40] We are going to work over the next 12 months with all of the various agencies that would be impacted by a merging, if you will, of our capital project delivery functions within the county.

[02:37:59] This would include public works. This would include our facilities and fleet management. This would include parks and recreation and obviously transportation. We would be working with those directors and all of the staff impacted over the next 12 months to ensure that we are properly crosswalking who belongs where.

[02:38:17] But we are looking to deliver on what we know will be the next two decades, really, of significant building that we have to do in this county. And so I am very optimistic about this, feel like we are certainly in a place where we need as a county to move in the direction of standardizing the way in which we deliver on the capital projects and the capital funding that this board has approved.

[02:38:46] Happy to talk more about that and answer questions. Obviously, this will be a very important discussion that we have with staff. Part of the reason I did not want to just do this and just come to the board with a merged department is because I know that this is one that will take time and that we want to make sure that the staff that are impacted by this decision have an opportunity to talk through and understand where they fit into this new approach.

[02:39:20] That said, summarizing the budget, again, consistent with what we are required to do, and that is to deliver you a balanced budget, what you see here is the five-year plan for our enterprise or for our government.

[02:39:40] And so you see revenues, what we are recommending by way of expenditures for FY26 proposed, and then the available capacity in blue on this slide. I'm happy to talk more, I'm sure we will, about this slide.

[02:39:58] So that brings us to the tax rate. Based on all the things that I've included here in this slide deck, where that leaves us is at a flat tax rate of 92 cents.

[02:40:16] What that will mean for residents is on average, as of now, a 5.6% increase based on real estate assessments and or a $276 increase for property tax bills. We are also recommending that the fire levy stay flat as well, 7.2 cent fire levy. This would on average mean that the fire levy increases by $22 for homeowners. And then the personal property tax rate we have listed here at $3.70,

[02:40:57] which is the current rate. I'm sure we will talk a bit more about that. This is the diagram we show every year. I appreciate this one, and I think our residents do as well. This is a diagram that sort of shows where their dollar goes. And no surprise, the lion's share of our revenue goes to our schools. You will see that in addition to schools, safe and secure community,

[02:41:31] and then health and well-being are our top three strategic goals in terms of where our funding is going. I will say on this, it's an interesting, mostly for our public, I know the board knows this, For mobility, economic growth, and resiliency, many of the agencies within that quadrant are supported by these.

[02:41:50] And so not fully represented on this dollar in the way that they probably should be in terms of the, they certainly punch at their weight. All right. Moving on.

[02:42:05] In terms of public engagement, we will do what we do year over year. The portal for questions and answers will open, I believe it's open now, so open this evening, and we will certainly be answering questions throughout.

[02:42:22] I think last year we got more questions through the portal than we have ever, and so certainly appreciate Dave and the team for doing all that they do to get responses out to the public and to the board as quickly as possible. And this last slide is really the calendar.

[02:42:40] So we know that this ultimately is the start of the public process. I want to really call the board's attention to something that is relatively new, and that is us identifying ahead of the budget process some of the areas where you all have really expressed some interest in hearing more about.

[02:43:01] And so we'll be talking on November 4th, I'm sorry, March 4th, March 4th, about the landfill. And we'll be talking on March 11th about both the fire and rescue station construction as well as all of the investments that we intend to make this year in our IT and IT infrastructure.

[02:43:29] We will have on March 18th the revenue forecast update from Michelle and Tim. And then we talked about this Q&A with directors. So last year we did it in a way where we did not say ahead of time that we would be doing it this year.

[02:43:50] We notified all the directors and that on April 1st we'll have all the directors here and certainly ready to answer any questions that you all may have. That said, the chair did mention earlier this afternoon that we will also be including a board finance and budget committee.

[02:44:07] And so that meeting will be scheduled, it's not listed here, but March 25th, the last Tuesday of March. And so many, many touch points as we go throughout the next few weeks in terms of budget discussions and opportunities for us to talk very publicly about what is being recommended.

[02:44:27] all things being equal and all goes well, we are hoping for budget adoption on April 22nd and budget markup the week before April 5th. And with that, Madam Chair, I believe that is all. Alright, thank you so very much for this robust presentation.

[02:44:48] Always appreciate it. For my board members, I know some people already jumped into queue, but I do want to divide up our questions to be more effective and to facilitate a robust discussion so i would like to start with the fy 2025 and the fy 2026 overview i'm sorry the fy 2025 review and the fy 2026 overview so if anyone has any questions on that area we'll start there after that we'll discuss compensation compensation budget initiatives that's going to be the long discussion and then finally we'll do budget summary plus public engagement last so starting

[02:45:27] us off. Does anyone have any questions about the first two sections? That is 2025 review and 2025 overview. Again, I know people are already in queue. I just want to make sure that you have questions on those sections. So with that, Supervisor Franklin. We are going to hold that until we get to budget initiatives or is that in the 2025-2026 overview. We're going to take the first section first. First two. All right.

[02:45:54] Vega. Thank you, Madam Chair. I guess for the sake of discussion for me personally, Obviously, my goal during this budget process is going to be, and I want to put this out already from the get-go, reduce the real estate tax rate, and we're going to have those conversations, I understand, and talk about other proposals that I would like for my colleagues to consider.

[02:46:14] So when we're talking about the budget review, is it appropriate here to discuss the rev share agreement? Yeah? Sure. That we have with the schools? That might be under budget initiatives.

[02:46:31] Budget initiatives. Well, I can make the argument that I think we can. Hold on, hold on, hold on. I mean, expenditures, highlights, 2020. You know, that is one.

[02:46:48] I would say let's leave that to initiatives, budget initiatives. Okay. Got anything else? Okay, all right. That's the big one. Everything else I have in order.

[02:47:05] Supervisor Weir. All right. None of this is going to come as any surprise to anybody, but this budget is a non-starter with me. I think everybody's aware of that. But I want to make a couple of things clear. I say this every year, and every year we play this game or the jurisdictions play this game.

[02:47:26] I don't like it. You know, if we look at page three, we talk about the tax rate decreasing. It doesn't matter what the tax rate did. It doesn't matter if it decreased. It doesn't matter if it increased. The only thing that matters is the tax paid.

[02:47:41] I don't want to pay this lip service game. We lowered the rate, but we raised your bill. I hate that. We do it every year. It drives me absolutely insane. I would note, though, that the tax bill still grew despite the rate increase. Now, they grew only fractionally at 20-some-odd dollars a year, but nonetheless they grew.

[02:48:02] And still in all, the general revenue increased by $183.6 million, or 13% for FY25. So, you know, how much of that is a result of residential taxes, vehicle taxes?

[02:48:19] It's kind of hard to say because we don't have that breakdown, how much of it actually came from the data centers. And if the data centers were supposed to pay for everything, then why are the tax bills still going up $26? So then you carry that over to page 4 and the school transfer.

[02:48:41] If you extrapolate out, we're looking at a significant increase year over year on the general revenue, far in excess of what I think anybody really thought. Bless you.

[02:48:58] Make sure I'm on the right page here. Got to the wrong page. And then we play the same game when we start talking about the FY26 at $1.99 billion in general fund revenue. If you extrapolate it out over FY25 and FY26, we've essentially come up to a 20% increase, $340 million, give or take, over a two-year period.

[02:49:29] That's just not sustainable in the long term. And if we keep going up at 10% a year, we're going to run into a wall at some point absent some fantastic new revenue stream that nobody else has thought. We need to get ahead of this before we get ourselves into a situation where we're going to have to significantly raise residential taxes, either at the real estate level or the vehicle tax level, simply to accommodate the growth that we're doing now that we probably can't sustain in the future, in addition to any other further growth.

[02:50:08] And then that presumes there isn't a hit in market prices on housing. It presumes we don't have out-migration, which Fairfax is starting to see. You know, there's a whole lot of things here, and I think we need to be aware of that and take that into consideration.

[02:50:25] But I really don't want to play this rate versus actual tax game. Let's be honest with everybody. It's actual tax paid, and that's not just the real estate tax. It's also the fire levy, the mosquito levy, and everything else. I'll get more deeply into this when we get to the revenue sharing agreement, because I think that's part of the problem.

[02:50:45] But for the time being, I will leave it at that. Supervisor Bode. Thank you, Madam Chair, for this section. Chris, you had a slide up, which I think is before this one or after this one. It's the 25 highlights where we talked about the $1.2 million increase to maintain the parks and rec.

[02:51:13] Yeah, I think you're going the right direction now. Keep going. Five. Yes. Thank you. So you talk about that, and you also talk about the $1 million pedestrian mobility safety investment that we made last year.

[02:51:32] Are those going to be ongoing, as in we're going to have that $1.2 million FY26, 27, and onward? Same thing with the million dollars. Are these sort of building funds? They are built in. Yes, they are built into the base.

[02:51:47] Appreciate that. Thank you. Supervisor Angry. Thank you. Hey, I just had a question. Thank you. When we talk real estate taxes and wanting to lower them, is there a point of concern, like a red flag, that you all can point out and how low that is before we start really getting into the diversity of what we have and revenue coming in where it's an alarm?

[02:52:21] And I have a follow-up to that, but my point to that is I don't know how low we can go with residential taxes before we find ourselves in the situation. My goal is never to have to raise them. So I want to get to a point where it's comfortable and we can sit there.

[02:52:39] We've got other revenue streams that support our general fund, and that if we find ourselves in a bind, we're not going back in to say we have to raise our taxes again. So I don't know. Is there any kind of data or study or something you can point to and say, okay, guys, we're at 92 now.

[02:52:55] If we go any lower than this, this is where we should be concerned. Yeah. I'd say that to answer the part of your question that really talks to the diversity of our base, I think that's an important one because that's one that our credit rating agencies continue to look at. And so for us, I think we are in a phenomenal position in that we have a number of sources, while property tax does represent the largest part of the pie. It is not, uh-oh, I don't

[02:53:29] know where did that go i think page seven probably had it yeah where real estate represents the largest part of the pie there are other sources and that is honestly one of the things that makes us an elite uh jurisdiction yeah and so that's where i would be i would start sounding the alarm if we started losing sources yes and i don't want you to because i only got a couple minutes so just you're helping me here because when i came into this in 2019 my thing was we should lower real estate assessment and get personal property higher but the reality is that's not going to happen

[02:54:05] because our real estate tax is a tax that kind of survives spencerham county bottom line got it now i see that uh there was a i got the message you sent out about the cmp tax that we had an opportunity to pull out personal property from you know basically i don't know if that's an opportunity that we should look at because one of the things i think we could help out our constituents with are the used vehicle tax.

[02:54:33] And so it's an area that I'm speaking to the board now, not you, but I'm speaking to the board. And to me, that's an area of opportunity that we can to supervisor where's point when you're talking about a tax is a tax is a tax and what people are paying. I want to help and lower where it needs to be lowered to assist with that, especially given our current state of affairs in the county in America, to tell you the truth.

[02:54:56] But I'm concerned where is that red zone mark of real estate and assessments and what else can we do to help in these areas. So if we can split that, I love that opportunity, and I think an area that I want to focus on is that used car tax and how we can help cut that in half or whatever we can do with that.

[02:55:16] I don't want to give a number because it's a board decision, but I just want to put that out there. That's all I have right now, Madam Chair. Thank you. Thank you, sir. All right, Supervisor Bailey. Thank you very much, Madam Chair. Chris, great presentation. I just want to ask on page 5 for the contributions to housing trust under the FY25 budget highlights.

[02:55:38] Yes. You said that the trust fund would become solid once the ordinance is established. Yes, ma'am. So what I was saying is essentially we will bring an ordinance, and as part of that, as of now, We are contemplating also bringing the sort of standards we will use to create the trust, the housing trust.

[02:56:04] Okay. And so right now those are coupled together. Once we actually have the board consider and vote on that ordinance, we anticipate that the trust will be established. As of now, that is just a reserve. So all of the funding that the board has set aside so far and contemplate setting aside is sitting in a reserve in the same way that other funds are sitting in reserve.

[02:56:29] Okay, okay, that's clarity for me. And then the other thing that I want to ask, if I may, also for the 2025 budget review on page three, just want to highlight and just, I think it's a big deal, too, that we had a general revenue increase of 13%.

[02:56:49] what was it before do you recall if you don't it's okay i just what would i just wanted to know what that increase looks like i have a feeling that dave has it dave no dave yeah because that is a significant growth and i have a figure in my head but i just don't want to we'll find it okay okay i'm good when you find it thank you all right while you guys find it i'm going to go over to Gordy. Thank you, Madam Chair. On this slide, I just want to clarify. So the headline is

[02:57:26] average residential tax bill. But what we're talking about is a real estate tax rate. So none of this includes this average of $26. That does not include industrial properties, commercial properties. Or is this only residential or is this everybody? This is only residential.

[02:57:50] OK, it's only residential. Yeah. So do we know because if it's an average of 26 and knowing that mine went up 10 times that there had to be a lot of people who also actually paid less. Yes. Do we know what percentage of Prince William County residents actually paid less last year on their property taxes because we lowered this tax rate in terms of real dollars?

[02:58:14] That would actually require an out, so we would have to calculate that as sort of a median and how many residents fell below in terms of the $26 we would need to calculate. I'm almost sure we wouldn't have that on hand now, but we'll certainly take that question down and use that as one of the Q&As.

[02:58:35] Yeah, and I think it's helpful because, and as we discussed this last spring, we talked about housing affordability. And this was a way we could go ahead and start it today. And understanding how we actually affected that, I think it's helpful for us to know that we actually did some good for a lot of residents in this county.

[02:58:56] That we actually reduced their costs because everything else is going up. And so I was actually pretty proud that this board actually took action to reduce in real dollars the taxes that people paid. And I think at that time we estimated about 60%.

[02:59:15] And so giving them that tax break when their insurance is going up, utilities are going up. And so I think it's just helpful for us to be able to know what the impact was on that. And I'll let him go answer the Supervisor Bailey's question.

[02:59:33] Thank you. Are you ready? All right. We're ready. Vice Chair, Bailey, you do it today, and you want to. Okay. Fiscal year 2024 general revenue increase over fiscal year 2023 was 12.7%, and I'm calculating the total general revenue increase at about $158 million.

[02:59:53] Thank you, Dave. All right. Supervisor Ware. I did want to, thanks, I did want to echo what Supervisor Angry was saying is I would, you know, we've got opportunities here potentially to really provide our residents with additional tax relief and really trying to focus that on the residents.

[03:00:26] And so, you know, if the idea of finding a way to reduce that car tax and separate that out from the C&P tax, I think I would also be interested in figuring out what opportunities are there for us to be able to do that.

[03:00:43] Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair. Supervisor Angri's question. I mean, this is what frustrates me, and we're going round and round, and nobody's giving the real answer here. And the real answer is there's no red line, there's no minimum, there's no maximum.

[03:01:00] You can increase or decrease the rate because it's a two-part equation. It's got two variables. It's not just the rate, it's the assessed value. So if your assessed values go down, you have to raise the rate to accrue the same revenue.

[03:01:16] If the assessed values go up, then it's a matter of adjusting the rate. If the assessed values go up 10%, you can drop the rate a little bit and arrive at a flat tax bill. If assessed values go up 50%, you can hack the damn tax rate in half.

[03:01:33] So sitting here arguing about or trying to figure out what's the baseline we can get to, you can't do it that way. You have to put the two parts of the equation together, the two variables. And what really kind of stuns me is, you know, we're able to break out what the residential taxes paid are and how much the average bill went up.

[03:01:56] But if indeed there is so much capital investment in the county, there is so much increase in assessed values, particularly of industrial parcels, why are they still going up at all?

[03:02:12] I thought that capital investment and the increased assessed value of these commercial properties, particularly the data centers, were supposed to drive a decrease, and we're still not seeing it. We're still seeing a $26 a month, or a $26 increase, and this year we're talking about almost $300.

[03:02:35] So I think everybody needs to get on the same page in how we're arriving at this rate and what the rate actually means. All right. We're going to go on, actually, I should have said this, budget priorities. That's the next one, and that's where we could talk about, because that's a priority, that's where we can talk about revenue sharing agreement.

[03:02:56] So, Yesley, Bob, hurry up, jump into the queue, because I know that that's something you mentioned previously. Let's see who's first. ooh body dang all right you go so budget initiatives oh budget priorities i forgot that yeah so that's where we talk about what are our high level things that we'd love to see what's important to us as a board yeah so the revenue sharing agreements sorry revenue sharing agreement it's in another slide a little bit ahead of what we have every year the revenue sharing but then

[03:03:32] we have a little bit extras right uh the um class size reduction grants the gainesville debt service school security program um have we talked with the school division in recent years on if that's i know that the gainesville high school debt service is sort of locked in until that that debt service isn't paid off so i'm not as worried about that that'll probably eventually go away but the other two the class size reduction grant and the school security program frankly i feel like these are now just sort of in the budget as inertia and so have we talked to the school

[03:04:10] division recently on if those are the best places for those revenues every year. So you're looking at between those two about a million and a half dollars not you know a massive amount in the grand scheme of things especially knowing how big the school division's budget is but again it's sort of inertia at this point so we had those kind of conversations. We certainly we do we have ongoing conversations with the schools but I would not say that we've talked to them about these investments in particular and whether they need to be refreshed is essentially what you're asking.

[03:04:43] Certainly could have that conversation. We just have not. And I assume, and the schools will certainly correct me if I'm wrong, they will certainly be prepared to talk about this when they come before the board in a few weeks and whether these investments need to be refreshed.

[03:05:04] Appreciate it. And the last thing I'll say about this, again, I just feel like at this point there are inertia kind of items. And I've heard through the grapevine that because we've given the school division so much more money over the last few years that this may not be the right use for the highest and best use for those dollars. So I just want to make sure that we have that conversation.

[03:05:21] Absolutely. Thank you. Supervisor Bailey. Thank you, Madam Chair. We are on priorities, right? I'm making sure. Okay. So I just wanted to just highlight, if I could, and I'm on the wrong page, just highlight, if I could, just, you know, in terms of the budget priorities, this is a continuation, as you said before, of what we have discussed in the prior budget.

[03:05:48] And I appreciate that because I know that there needs to be high investment in our technology department specifically. But no surprise, I appreciate sustaining the Crisis Receiving Center while we're obtaining that Medicaid waiver.

[03:06:08] And I know that Glenn keeping his eye on that for us during legislative time, he and Nikki, but there is a positive trajectory. And I just wanted to highlight that to say that the waiver is in.

[03:06:27] It did pass in the General Assembly on both Senate and House side. So we are on a positive trajectory. So that is, you know, one of the projects specifically that we're nearing completion. I appreciate that and the investment because we still need to heal minds.

[03:06:45] And so I'm just saying that. There's a big comment. Thank you, Madam Chair, for letting me say that. But the other thing is we have also been very consistent on improving our park facilities. So what does that look like in terms of, and most of that was the investment from ARPA funding earlier.

[03:07:08] How does that look in terms of our current budget? Are we still on a good momentum with that? No, I appreciate that question. It's a great question. We are still wrapping up ARPA dollars. Fortunately, I will say for Michelle and really the entire team, we got in the final report to Treasury obligating all ARPA dollars.

[03:07:31] That said, we still have another two years to spend down the ARPA dollars. Parks and Recreation, they have been doing a phenomenal job spending down their portion of ARPA on various projects.

[03:07:47] the importance of that question is one where we need to and we've we certainly saw appreciate the board doing it last year and would appreciate the board doing it this year we need to start building in the maintenance for all the projects that were completed using those arpa dollars and that's what this would do supervisor bodey asked the question of whether the funding last year was built into the base and it was and the funding this year would be built into the base so we would be essentially hiring those FTEs to provide that maintenance on those projects that were listed

[03:08:20] in perpetuity. And I appreciate that because with the ARPA dollars, I wanted to know how much time we had. But also that maintenance piece is something that we haven't done for a very long time. So we have to really look at the investment of that. So that's all I have, Madam Chair. Thank you. Thank you. Next is Supervisor Vega. Thank you, Madam Chair. I have two priorities that I want to discuss right now for this portion. Chris, when was the last time that we went through the vacancy status report? That report is sent out to us monthly.

[03:08:56] Monthly. So HR sends it out monthly. Okay. And what action has been taken, and I'm specifically referring to the nearly 50 positions that have not been filled for over nine months or more? Well, I'll say we go through, we have gone through quite a bit to increase the level of hiring that is happening within our county.

[03:09:21] Some positions are harder to fill than others. I will also say that agencies have really worked hard over this last year to fill positions. So just this morning, I was talking to the planning office about the six FTEs that were funded as part of the FY25 budget.

[03:09:43] All six of those FTEs have been filled. That's it. They still have four vacancies. Those four vacancies were created months ago when there were internal promotions and movement, right? And so it is a constantly moving picture.

[03:10:01] Employees are promoted within this organization, employees choose other jobs, are recruited to other agencies within the organization. So given the vacancy savings work that we do, the vacancy savings that we project, and the constant movement of our employees, I suspect that that vacancy list will always have vacancies on it for an organization our size.

[03:10:29] know, and this is partly why I'm asking for the investment in HR, we work really hard to make sure that we are recruiting the most skilled and talented workforce possible. We don't have the ability, and I don't think we ever will, an organization our size to have zero vacancies.

[03:10:50] Thank you for your response, and I can understand that, and I'm sure that we're hiring the most qualified individuals. However, when we go through this vacancy report, which is a reason why I requested it and I know that all my colleagues got it when you have a position being unfilled for 915 days that's a problem that's a major problem that's the highest one that I found but we have others 700 plus days 600 plus days and we can go on and on and on so this is not positions that haven't been filled in a few weeks or a couple of months we're talking about

[03:11:23] 915 days and so as we have these conversations about more requests for FTEs these vacancies have to be addressed because if an agency can go 915 days or more without filling a position how does that agency come to this board and ask us for additional FTEs? I definitely appreciate that you know without looking at which position that is a number of things could be happening right? So the position could be a hard position to fill. And so we could have moved to take that,

[03:11:58] the personnel services dollars for that position and filled it with a contract, right? Or we could have, so I would almost need to look at the position to find out what exactly the agency did during this time period. I'm sure there are examples where a position has gone unfilled and we absolutely need to look at it and ask the question, is this position one that needs to be reclassified to do another job because we are providing a different kind of service.

[03:12:29] But I would not be able to just say because it's been a few hundred days, that position is no longer needed. Yeah. Well, Madam Chair, I am asking for that to be analyzed and for that to be brought back to us in an update as we make the decisions in terms of priority for this budget cycle, and this is why, Chris, when you go through the vacancy report, I found 49 positions, okay?

[03:12:56] Whatever the reasons may be, I'll give you the benefit of the doubt that they're justified. With us amending and looking at this vacancy report and figuring out what's happening, okay, I can easily find $3 million in savings based on positions that have gone. I'll go quick, Just one page alone, 684 days, 558 days, 469 days, 600 days, 698 days, 404 days.

[03:13:22] And I mean, I can go on and on and on. So that matters because when we're talking about the challenges that folks in this county are facing, right, with the cost of living and everything in between, $3 million extra dollars in our budget is a lot of money that we can figure out where to prioritize.

[03:13:40] And so, Madam Chair, I don't know what this is going to look like or, you know, for you, but I do want for this vacancy report to be looked at and for an update to be provided to this board because there are a lot of positions that have been vacant for a very long time and I don't see the value in asking for more FTEs when so many positions have gone unfilled for so long.

[03:14:02] Absolutely. Okay, thank you. Supervisor Weir, if you want to jump in for more time. I'll jump in, pick up where yesterday we left off first. There shouldn't be news to anybody. We've had this discussion in the past about the vacancy report, about the long-term vacancies.

[03:14:21] And if something's vacant for 900 days, maybe you don't need the damn position. I don't care if it's hard to fill. If it means contracting it out at a cheaper rate, if we're already contracting it out, we need to get a hold of it. We need to get a handle on this. I mean, I looked at it. You've got 309 vacancies as of January 1.

[03:14:40] That's not an anomaly. It's pretty usual. And I get it. A lot of them are police department, a lot of them are ADC, and a lot of them are hard to fill. But at some point in time, we've got to get a handle on, you know, some of the other, like, you want to add some social services, HR positions, where we've already got extended vacancies, and we're just going to make the problem worse.

[03:15:04] And I'll leave it at that, man. I've been on this soapbox for the last two years, and I never seem to get a response as to how we're going to deal with it. But I want to go back to the revenue sharing agreement. If I can, Supervisor, just because I just got some information. So for two of the positions that we're talking about where they are over 700, 800 days, two of those positions at the highest level are those health department positions that we just talked about.

[03:15:31] So they weren't filled because we never created a local health department. Then they need to come out of here, and they need to come out of the budget, which they probably already have, but we need to be clear on that. Well, when we, so if we're going to send the board a vacancy report, it's going to include all the FTEs.

[03:15:51] And ultimately, what we're trying to do with this budget is transfer those five positions to the health department, and they are critically needed in the health department so that they can be filled. But what I wanted to do is give an example, based on the example, Supervisor Vega, that you gave, of two positions where we know why they weren't filled because we didn't create a health department.

[03:16:14] But there's a whole bunch of other ones where that circumstance doesn't apply, and I think that's to Supervisor Vega's point. While I've got time, I want to jump back to the Revenue Sharing Agreement. We sat here last year and had this argument, and I was told we couldn't do anything about the Revenue Sharing Agreement.

[03:16:30] We had to do it off-cycle, do it in November, and we didn't do it. So I want something done now. Revenue Sharing Agreement was done in 1998. It's poorly written. It's vague. It doesn't really say much to it. It was amended once. I don't see an MOU. There was supposed to be an MLU.

[03:16:48] Do we have one? No, we don't have an MLU. So we don't even have any standards, not only for us, but for the school division. They give us a baseline budget that's lacking in detail. They don't even supply us the information oftentimes that they're statutorily done.

[03:17:05] And then we blindly hand them surplus money that we've earned through our savings, not theirs. Seems to be a one-way street. We give them X percent of our surplus, but they don't give us X percent of their surplus, now do they? Should work both ways.

[03:17:22] So I think we need to come up with an MOU. I think we need to get away from automatically transferring surplus funds to them. They're fully funded when this budget leaves here. So I think we need to amend the base revenue sharing agreement to make sure that we're not doing the surplus.

[03:17:40] I think we need to put in some requirements, bare-bone requirements for them as to what they need to supply us in terms of the nine buckets and at least some detail in their budget. And then, you know, if somebody still wants to spend their portion or their portion of the surplus on the schools, fine.

[03:18:02] I got an idea. Take the X millions of dollars that we gave them and use it to buy down the debt service on the Gainesville High School, then we knock it out of next year's budget. We got to be a little bit more creative. But we need to fix the revenue sharing agreement.

[03:18:17] We need to fix it this budget cycle. I'm tired of waiting. The residents are tired of waiting. It's irresponsible the way we're running this, and it's time to fix it. So I'm going to jump in because I want to talk to Mrs. Short about that. I mean, the majority of the board does support revenue share, but we can have a discussion about maybe how to make it better.

[03:18:36] But I will say, and I've said this before, you know, for my 1-8th, it does give the school some kind of certainty. You know, if we could talk about categorical funding. I've spoken to people in other jurisdictions that have categorical funding, and they don't necessarily get the oversight they feel they deserve.

[03:18:52] But this is a big issue, and I want to make sure that we do have clarity. So, Mr. Shorter, I will speak with you at a future time. Madam Chair, I'm just asking for an MOU so that it's in writing. Okay. You know, before I go on to Supervisor Gordy, I'm just going to make one quick point on budget priorities.

[03:19:10] One of them is to improve existing park facilities. Looking at all my colleagues on the dais, let's spend your park proffers, okay? I asked for a directive. We got how much we have for each district, you know, in park proffers with restrictions, not restrictions. I'm just saying, y'all, spend it.

[03:19:26] If you need help, we'll certainly step in and help you spend. With that, Supervisor Gordy. Madam Chair, we're working on it, and I'd love to – we have the opportunity to create an incredible park on a 500-acre parcel.

[03:19:44] And at some point, I hope we can have a conversation that that's available to us. It also would create tremendous open space, but I'm hoping that we can have that conversation. As it also goes to point one, advance our strategic priorities, which that is one of our strategic priorities in our upcoming strategic plan.

[03:20:07] On point two, the only thing I would also add, invest in staffing and technology to improve effective and efficient service and delivery. I think we also have to include training in that conversation because a lot of the constituent challenge issues that I'm addressing is due to a misinterpretation of certain laws or certain ordinances, and there's a lack of consistency across the application between individuals within each department on the application of ordinances.

[03:20:38] So I think it's also, in order to get after that effective and efficient service, It's also making sure that we're making sure that customer-facing experience is one that's consistent across the board in terms of application.

[03:20:56] And then to go back to the school's revenue agreement, I mean, when this was done in 98, I completely concur. We've got to look at this differently. In 1998 through the 2000s, we could not keep up with the growth.

[03:21:15] The growth in the Brentsville area, Gainesville area, and other parts of the county was on a significant trajectory. And today it's more flat. And right now the projection for school growth is decreased enrollment.

[03:21:32] And yet we're on a trajectory to increase funding and funding and funding over time simply because that's the formula that we have. And so I think at some point we've got to take a look at reality of where we are in the 2020s, not in the 1990s, and say what is the right balance and what is that right understanding and collaboration that we need to have.

[03:21:57] Look, I've been pushing for, you know, given what I'm seeing in terms of development coming, but the responses I continue to get back from the schools is, well, we're still projecting a decline in enrollment over time. So if that's the case, we do need to have a serious conversation about how much of this funding from our taxpayers is going to a program that the people who are running are admitting it's in decline.

[03:22:23] So it's either in decline or it's not. Make up your mind, but if it's in decline, then we need to take a look at this revenue-sharing agreement based on that reality. And then I'd like to just speak briefly in just one question related to compensation.

[03:22:43] You know, for our first responders, you know, as we are now into the agreements with the unions, you know, one of the things I've been concerned about is our competitive edge with our surrounding jurisdictions.

[03:23:01] And so two questions. One is, based on those agreements, are we still in a competitive wage compared to our surrounding localities? And number two, can you speak to our attrition rate right now and how we're performing in that area?

[03:23:18] Sure. So in terms of the CBAs and our competitiveness, I will say that the CBAs aren't in essence. The compensation studies is what we use really to make sure that we are continuing every few years to analyze where we are as compared to the surrounding jurisdictions.

[03:23:40] So it's those compensation studies that keep us competitive. It's why we are recommending that we make the investments this year in the sheriff and ADC. And why we will next year be making a recommendation that we provide based on the findings and the compensation study for police and fire.

[03:23:59] The CBAs are a bit different in that they are the bargaining units' negotiated increases. I will say that the step increases associated with the CBAs, we will likely continue to see.

[03:24:17] Those certainly go a long way in making sure that we are not falling behind within our pay scale. But the bargaining units are not necessarily studying within the CBA the compensation. They work with us closely when we do compensation studies, though.

[03:24:37] I don't know if that answered your question. But I was getting after the attrition, because we're trying to recruit, we're also trying to retain. So how are we doing on the retention side as we're looking at this?

[03:24:54] And again, if everything only existed within Prince William County, it would be one thing, but we have a lot of jurisdictions competing for the same talent. So I just want to know how we're performing in order to retain those that we're training on our forces to stay here in Prince William County?

[03:25:09] I believe we are at zero vacancies within the sheriff's office. ADC has absolutely had a challenge with attrition, which is why you see the larger-than-average increase being recommended for market adjustment for ADC.

[03:25:28] We are comparing them against jurisdictions, one in which there's, oh, that's more sheriff. So, yes, we definitely have some work to do on the ADC side. With police and with fire, we have all been to just the increase in the number of graduating academy classes that they have.

[03:25:50] We are now seeing three and four classes per year where in other jurisdictions really across the country, real challenges with recruiting police officers. That is just not the case here in Prince William County. real challenges with maintaining fire and rescue personnel, not the case here. And I believe that it is certainly more than just pay, but pay matters. And we have absolutely gone a long way over this last few years in investing in making sure our employees understand that we value them and that we'll be willing to sort of put that value, quantify that value, if you will.

[03:26:29] Mr. Supervisor Gordy, you're going to jump back in queue. It is a problem specifically at ADC.

[03:26:46] In fact, this compensation study told us almost exactly where we're losing, sort of at what point after that five-year period where we're starting to lose, like you said, trained, experienced personnel.

[03:27:03] And it is in large part due to pay. They can go get just in the jurisdiction over, in some cases, a signing bonus and additional pay. I can't give that for each of the public safety quadrants.

[03:27:19] We will certainly look into it. Obviously, we're going to take down this question. I need down for two. All right. Supervisor Vega, then Bailey. Thank you, Madam Chair. Just to wrap up the point on the vacancy report and to answer Tom's question, and to your point, Chris, The first seven pages of this report are ADC positions.

[03:27:40] So, yes, I understand the challenge. And the turnover rate, it's a whopping 12.39%. And so we can obviously improve in those areas. But I would also, Chris, like for you all to consider maybe implementing something. If a position, my recommendation would be, and obviously this is something that my colleagues can, you know, consider and think about as we continue through the budget process, If a position maybe isn't filled within nine months, we have to take action so that we don't allow for positions to go almost a thousand days on this report.

[03:28:12] And so I'm just going to close it up with that ask, you know, knowing that you've already committed to looking into that. And then the second priority, Madam Chair, we've been going around in circles, I think, for a very long time, not just tonight, about the rev share agreement with the school division.

[03:28:29] I am prepared to make an offer for us to consider tonight, and I was under the impression that that's what we were going to do. So I'm not sure if you're ready to have that conversation right now or where in the process you want to have it, because I played with numbers, right?

[03:28:47] And I can figure out where we can, you know, make up for it and what we would generate if, you know, the split looked something different than what it currently is right now. But I hear you saying, Madam Chair, that you want to talk about your priorities at a later time, So I just want to make sure that I'm going in order here. No. So what I think, you know, and I will speak with Mr. Shorter because, you know, when the schools have their presentation, and I think that we need to have a deeper discussion on this.

[03:29:12] And I'm going to take my five minutes right now, and then we can go back to Vick if you have any. But I still have three minutes. I know. We're going to stop. Just one second. Stop the clock. Because I just want to say something real quick. So for schools, because you asked about revenue sharing, and that's a big, you know, topic of contention enrollment yes it's slipping but we also have an increased need of students with special needs and our english language learners we're seeing an increase in that and so those are programs that cost more and our schools in my humble opinion have been underfunded for so long we have allowed a ground to make up and i'm just saying this real quick um you know again not to

[03:29:50] dismiss you we're going to come back to your three minutes in fact i'm going to have time you're going to take the rest of my time so that means i'm giving you just a tad extra time but we do need to talk about schools. We do need to talk about revenue sharing, but I don't want to oversimplify. Enrollment's not the only issue, and so that's why I just interrupted, because I guess I know this is for a lot of people. This is a touchy, or not a touchy, but it's going to require a deep dive. We're not going to solve this today, so I will speak with Mr. Shorter. We'll talk about when's a great time to tee it up, and everyone on the board will be informed, and with that, you could take my three minutes and 56 seconds well I just want to say that the

[03:30:30] school board already the school division already present their budget this is our process this is our budget so we don't have to wait for the school board dr. Latif or dr. McDade to come to chambers to talk about this this is now our process and for us to decide whether or not we're going to continue with the current split between us and the school division bless you and so you know I I think that it's important to highlight, Madam Chair, you've mentioned two programs that need funding.

[03:30:58] And nobody's talking about not funding those programs. But I think that it's equally important to share that about 10% of the school budget goes to administrative positions at the Kelly Leadership Center. So when we're talking about better pace for teachers, for our educators, when we're talking about, we keep talking about our students.

[03:31:19] And I'm a mother of two kids that go to Prince William County Public Schools. So when we keep talking about, you know, our kids deserve a world-class education, as a parent and as a taxpayer, I keep asking myself, when will that happen? Because it's just a talking point. But at what point does it really mean something, right?

[03:31:36] And so, you know, I'm going to go ahead and propose it, and you can think about it. The county executive can think about it. Staff can think about it. And my colleagues can think about it. And then we can come back at, you know, the next budget meeting and say, yes, Lee, your proposal is dead on arrival, and these are my reasons.

[03:31:52] or maybe this is a point for us to actually start having the conversation about what that rev share agreement can look like. And, Madam Chair, I would like to propose that we amend and or consider changing the revenue share agreement to an even 50-50 split. And I am, again, tonight prepared to talk about where we're going to make that up and what is that going to look like, but that would generate approximately $135 million in additional revenue for the county.

[03:32:18] And I know that the media is here, and I know that the media is watching, So before you all go writing something that I never said, no, Supervisor Vega is not cutting education. No, Supervisor Vega is not trying to cut education for our children or essential programs. I have receipts and proofs as to how we keep funding them to include the state funding that they receive and the federal funding and what this would do for other priorities that we have in our budget.

[03:32:46] Supervisor Bailey. Thank you, Madam Chair. Several things. One is, Chris, I wanted to ask you, well, let me continue with the education piece. I agree with, I appreciate my colleagues' comments on this, and I appreciate Bob saying that it was established in 1998, and it was established in 1998 because of the inequities, pardon me, of what was going on on either side of the county, and the eastern part of the county was getting lack of support on the eastern side of the county.

[03:33:22] And so it was established by Betty Covington and John Harper. And so what I'd like to see is for us to have a more robust conversation about that because we don't want to go backwards. We want to go forward. And I would love for the school superintendent or the chairman of the board to come and talk about the awards that they're getting for this investment.

[03:33:47] I'd like for them to talk about not just the awards, but how the increase per student has happened. since this board has been in existence and what that means as it relates to the diversity in our county. I think that's very key when we talk about expending funds. I don't want us to just say we're not getting information. Maybe we just need more information from the school board as to how those dollars are being spent. But when we sit down in a joint meeting and we see how they've explained where they've expended and the type of awards and how the kids are increasing their education,

[03:34:27] how we're also creating different ways of teaching because of the dialects that we have in our county, I think that's where the investment is. And so I agree with my colleagues, maybe we just need more details, because from the time that I came on the board in 2019 to now, we've seen more engagement.

[03:34:46] Maybe we just need even more engagement in detail to give us a comfortability of where we need to be. Because I think that's necessary. And I would, and Supervisor Vega, I appreciate your numbers and I appreciate what you're offering. I'd like to engage with you more on that and see what that looks like.

[03:35:05] But I don't want us to decrease because of the area that we live in, the people that live here, and the expectations. And so I just think we need to have a deeper dive in terms of that, just putting that out there, because I see the positiveness in where we're going with this as well.

[03:35:22] So I know the purpose of the revenue share agreement and why, and I think we've benefited from it. But before we make a rash decision on how we're going to change it, I think we need, as a board, to talk about it more, Madam Chair, if we can. The other thing that I want to offer is for the compensation study that you were talking about, Chris, How often do we do that type of compensation study for our law enforcement specifically?

[03:35:50] Because as I remember, outside of the board, before I became elected and inside, we hadn't done it quite a lot at all. So could you explain that? Because I think it's a tool that we use as we're supporting our law enforcement officers. You're absolutely right. I actually don't know, in terms of the history, how often we were doing it prior to.

[03:36:13] this sort of collective bargaining environment that we are in now, we have committed to every few years. So every two or three years, we will likely be going back out just to test. Now, I wouldn't say that we are always going to be in a position when we do a collective compensation study that we're going to need to do any market adjustment. But those studies really help us to make sure that we are keeping to our commitment to stay competitive. And so every two or three years in some cases four but we will continue to do it at a regular tick and I'll say

[03:36:50] with the bargaining units generally speaking we're going to be doing it in partnership with them so we'll likely be conducting the compensation study then working with them to show the results both for police and for fire okay and the reason why I ask that because as we're doing those studies that certainly helps us to to to be more competitive in terms of our salaries and that's where we were not prior to 2019. So I just want to make that point. The other thing is on page 14 in compensation increases for FY2026 Hold on. We're going to get into compensation next. So we're just on budget priorities.

[03:37:30] So with that, we have Supervisor Franklin. I know you're back in but maybe we could pick you up at some other time because I want to make sure everyone has their two and we're going to keep moving on. So Supervisor Franklin? Yeah, I just want to touch on a couple of things. First with the vacancies, I think it's important to understand that even if we have a goal of filling the vacancies, we have to have the human resources to actually do so. I know that's one of the challenges that's been with the landfill. We want to extend the hours. I think we're doing so, but we wanted to do it a lot quicker before now. But you got to have people that are willing to do

[03:38:06] the job to do so. So I just want my colleagues to keep that in mind. We all want to fill vacancies, but we need the human resources to actually do that. Also, I just want to talk about the revenue sharing agreement that we've been discussing. One of the things that we have to keep in mind is that the state is not funding education at the levels that they should be, and the JLARC report has come out stating as such, we're one of the few states in the entire country that funds education at the formula level that we do, and that puts our education funding at a high disadvantage compared to most other states.

[03:38:46] I know multiple entities have been pushing for the state to change their formula funding so we can get more funding per pupil, and that's the challenge that we're facing now, and that's why localities are doing as much as we can to increase our funding each budget cycle for the school system because the state is not, even when the state gives more money towards education, which they've been doing over the past several years, it's still not as much as what it would be if they changed the way they do their formula funding.

[03:39:16] So that's the challenge that we're at. Until the state, the governor, agrees to change the formula funding, we're going to continue to have to give school systems more money from our own budgets to make sure that per-pupil spending increases. Also just wanted to touch on transportation funding and just making sure that, you know, we're having conversations with OmniRide, which impacts VRE and the subsidies that they're getting.

[03:39:45] Obviously, as the mandate to return to work continues to be executed and implemented, I think that's going to help public transportation. But we also have to make sure that we're sitting down and looking at the outlook in years to come for public transportation to make sure that OmniRide has a responsible budget and that the county only comes in when it's absolutely necessary and that we're not at the front end funding the bulk end of their transportation costs.

[03:40:15] But I know that Dr. Schneider and our chair is committed to making sure that we have a responsible budget on the OmniRide side. And then lastly, Mr. Shorter, if you can just talk a little bit more about the CRC Medicaid waiver and to just give a, you've done this before, but if you can just break it down a little bit more in layman's terms in terms of where we are exactly with making sure that we can get the CRC up and running on a good programming with regards to the Medicaid piece. Sure. So I'll say mostly for the public, because I know each of you know this, with the crisis receiving center, the crisis

[03:40:52] Receiving Center, the intent of the Crisis Receiving Center is to deal with supporting individuals in our county who are essentially suffering crisis and need support immediately, right? And so it's a Crisis Receiving Center. The Crisis Receiving Center is intended, based on the model, to receive Medicaid support or reimbursement to stay operational. And so

[03:41:25] So because we are in a situation with the state where they are not considering this an eligible activity to receive Medicaid reimbursement, we are now in this position where we need to work with the state to make sure that we are properly defined as a crisis receiving center and not as a facility that is meant for long-term care.

[03:41:50] Now, the state has created a process for us to work through getting waived, if you will, into being defined as crisis receiving. In the interim, we are, to some extent, and hopefully this doesn't make news, on our own.

[03:42:08] And what I mean by that is we are not eligible to receive Medicaid reimbursement. Well, it is what it is. I mean, that's important for you to say. And so we are in a position right now where we need to account for using local dollars, account for the operation of the crisis receiving center.

[03:42:26] Now, we believe, based on what we've been told, the waiver process will take between 18 and 24 months. We are on our way. We've received some really good news from the state. And so we hope that this will be a one-time investment that we are making in local dollars to get the crisis receiving center open and operational and that hopefully in the FY26 budget year we will receive some really good news and be in a position to begin to receive reimbursements for the activities at the crisis receiving center.

[03:43:02] Thank you. We're going to close out that. Supervisor Rear, can you hold? Because we're going into compensation. I know Vega just had a quick clarifying moment. Are you good? Let me ask my actual questions and you can close out with your comment um real quick uh i know that i asked about unencumbered funds on the school side and then they came back to us at our last meeting and gave us a number but but we were told that it was a portion that was only encumbered so i i want to know how much of that remains unencumbered and um also to supervisor franklin's point about this formula

[03:43:40] i want to know how long that formula has been in place because she you know referenced that that formula needs to change because a portion of their funding you know is from the state but that we have to pick up the slack you know I went on the school website and I looked at their budget presentation and per their own account the portion of their budget is mainly funded by the county transfer which is 46.9 percent and then the biggest bulk of the remainder of their budget funding comes from the state at 40.6%.

[03:44:14] So just kind of curious what that formula is, how long it's been in place, when is it going to change, and the portion of the remaining balance that has not been encumbered. Thank you. Sure. Supervisor Ware, and then I know, Bailey, you're going to be on compensation.

[03:44:35] You're first for compensation. Very quickly, Madam Chair, I don't want to engage in revisionist history about the 1998 revenue sharing agreement. and i don't want anybody to get in here and start talking about how it's east versus west equity issues it wasn't it was about five-year budget plans and salary compensation and the differing requirements of the county and the school division with respect to salary compensation and this was to give the flexibility to school division to make sure that their teachers were paid properly and they could fund the budget and it was supposed to be reviewed periodically in In fact, every five-year budget plan was supposed to be opened up.

[03:45:13] And I'll just leave it at this. Given the last 25 years, I've had kids go all the way through the system in Prince William County. And I can tell you who probably will tell you they didn't spend it on salary compensation over the last 25 years, which is what it was supposed to be spent for, and that's the teachers. And now they're finally getting around to it 25 years later.

[03:45:35] If we're going to comment on it, I think everybody needs to read the original resolution and the adopted changes that were done a couple of years ago. But there's not enough in here to ensure the purpose, and I think we need to address it. All right, thank you.

[03:45:51] We are moving on to compensation. Y'all, compensation, Supervisor Bailey will go first. Okay, and so, Bob, I do read, and it was about making sure there was equity across the county, and so we're not going to get in that because the reason why I said that is because of what you said, we need to look at it again.

[03:46:13] And so where I am with that is I'm interested in seeing what you and Supervisor Vega were talking about. So I read my documents. You keep saying that. Let's read together, if you don't believe me. So in going forward to compensation, the question that I have is on page 14, and the question that I want to address is retiree health.

[03:46:40] Can you be a little more detail about that in terms of the 100,000? Because I'm wondering, and the reason why I'm asking this, Chris, is because I do know that we have employees that are seasoned and tenured in our staff, you know, and how does that protect them?

[03:47:02] How does that protect us? What is that? Sure. As Dave and Michelle, I think Dave's going to respond. This is a rebalancing and not necessarily an increase in retiree benefits. Dave, you want to make sure you turn your mic.

[03:47:18] Good evening, members of the board. Dave Sinclair, budget director. If the board recalls, during the FY25 budget process, the board increased the retiree health benefit that is paid to retirees. I think it increased from $5 per year of service to $6.50 per year of service.

[03:47:41] This is just maintaining the existing benefit that the board approved and increased in the FY25 budget. This does not increase the benefits further. This is just maintaining the existing program.

[03:47:57] Okay, it's just maintaining. Correct. Yes, ma'am. And, Madam Chair, I think that's all I have. That's all I have. Supervisor Brody. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you for that, Supervisor Bailey. That actually brings me, it's a perfect segue to my question.

[03:48:13] I know that this is something that's sort of gone back and forth. Some folks have been advocating for it over the past few years, but we know that since it sort of affects all retirees throughout the entire workforce, it's not something that's necessarily been negotiated independently within the CBAs. Was increasing the health care credit for the retirees considered this year?

[03:48:34] I know we continue to be asked it, for example. Are we going to look to address it in the future as we look at future budget cycles? Given that we are now in a bargaining environment, it is something that I would want to use more later in the calendar year.

[03:48:55] Understood. All right. I have one thing to say, and it kind of in some ways does fall on to what Supervisor Vega mentioned when we're talking about positions that have been open for a long time. You know, obviously we have some attrition in our ADC, and that is concerning.

[03:49:11] And, you know, and I'm going through the pay study. I just want to say this. You know, I appreciate the work that all of our hardworking members of our law enforcement, I mean, they're on the front lines. They are protecting us day in and day out. The only concern I have is making sure that we keep a premium for our police department.

[03:49:34] I've spoken to a number of members of law enforcement. You know, I'm also with them very concerned with recruitment and retention. So I just want to put it out here for me. One of the things i'm going to be looking at is making sure that we maintain that pay premium so i just want to go on record with that now it doesn't look like we have anyone else in the queue for compensation so with that we will go on to budget initiatives this is going to be a fun one y'all so all right i have bode thank you madam i have a few different ones on this um under economic development chris

[03:50:11] you had uh that tourism initiative that you're said is going to be funded yeah that one by uh my TOT for tourism um I know I asked this when we sat down but could you talk a little bit and and add some elaboration how that that position is different from some of the other efforts we've uh funded in the past in terms of rebranding the county trying to drive uh sort of that that outward facing push of marketing because to a lot of people that when I talk to you about it they they squint like how is that different so could you talk to them about sure one of the biggest difference is that it's not going to be an FTE. So we are actually using a, well, we'll be

[03:50:49] soliciting and using a PR firm that is going to be able to bring expertise that we wouldn't necessarily be provided with one professional staff person. That said, the intent here isn't to brand writ large the county, right? The intent here is really focused on tourism and getting more visitors to know the value in Prince William County, understand our amenities, and get them here, to spend resources in restaurants, hotels, and actually go to the

[03:51:27] parks, trails, museums, and other amenities that we have in the county. And so this PR firm will really be working almost exclusively on that as their core function with the county. And so not to say that that PR firm won't have other jobs, but that looks and feels a little different than what we've done in the past where we may have had a staff person focused on tourism. So this, in my mind, is very creative. I appreciate that the tourism team came up with this proposal, and that's why it's included, because it does feel a little bit

[03:52:07] different, and we will be getting expertise from a firm that does this kind of work to attract visitors, more visitors to the jurisdiction. And if I could appreciate that, Chris, and that last bullet you have under that technology subscriptions for visitor attraction, visit planning, lodging data, I know that's sort of part of a belt and suspenders approach to starting to track how effective it is. Are we going to start to be able to sort of drill down on the tax implications of that? How much people are spending from out of county? You know, meals, lodging, like mentioned here, trips, you know, admissions, things like that. I tell you, I mean, so I've gotten an

[03:52:46] opportunity to hear directly from Christina and the team on this. And to a large extent, we already have access to that kind of information. You would be surprised at how powerful some of the data we already have in terms of visitors, where they go, where they come from, how long they stay, what they do when they're here. And so I'm sure that Christina will take the opportunity during the Q&A in a few weeks to talk a bit about this if this comes up. But yes, the subscriptions, the data mining that we'll be doing with this additional funding will help support really what we already do. And we are very intelligent about who's coming to the county and where they're coming from.

[03:53:25] In some cases, as far away as New York to visit our parks and trails. So I'm going to have additional questions for that sort of work session because I want to talk about how much is going to add buys, other things like that. But to move on from that piece, going to the OmniRide subsidy discussion, I know it was mentioned earlier in terms of transit transportation.

[03:53:47] Right now you're proposing that we use the grantor's tax, the transit occupancy tax for mobility to fully fund their budget asks for this year. I remember us having a very robust discussion last year about the shortfalls on the long term of that.

[03:54:04] Frankly, my questions are this. One, is this a proposal right now because we frankly don't have many other large funding streams that are dedicated to transit? And two, what's that outlook? How long could we sustain funding OmniRide like this if we continue to do that?

[03:54:20] Well, I mean, so you see it. I mean, in this case, we're using fund balance. That is often not the best way or the most sustainable way to fund something this important to us. And so I will say that the time is now for us to talk about a more sustainable source of funding for public transportation.

[03:54:42] We are not recommending that we use, as you could see, general fund revenue to fund OmniRide. but we we should we should be we should be talking about that this budget season and i'm about to run out of time madam chair so do you want me to go back later or do you want me to just take my extra five minutes now if you want to take your extra five minutes you out okay appreciate that i'll do that right now to segue off of that because i'm going to again use this opportunity thank you for that chris to advocate for us to really heavily consider the cni tax this year um for a whole plethora of reasons um i'll talk more about that later when we have more in-depth discussions

[03:55:19] throughout the budget process, but you touched upon that piece right there, which right now what we're using to fund this is not sustainable. You know, we're going to be coming back here in a few years and continue to do it this way. You know, what are we doing? How are we really going to continue to fund the bus system and what have you?

[03:55:36] But more importantly, as we continue to look at growth, we have folks that come in, you know, every few weeks to talk about during public comment time. They want us to focus housing around transit corridors. But we need funding for transit corridors. We know that the future of alleviating traffic in this county is not just building more roads.

[03:55:55] We know that. So in order for us to really come across and really step forward on that, we need to start funding transit in a much bigger way. And to me, that's a C&I tax. Again, one, that's not subject to the revenue sharing agreement, so it's all given to the transit and transportation side of things.

[03:56:12] But more importantly, it allows us to have a much more dedicated, much more sustainable, much more predictable way of funding transit. So for my one-eighth of the board, I really want us to heavily consider that. Because like you said, now is the time to really think about that and really adopt something that we know can grow over time, knowing that, again, as we continue to make more investments in developments, more ability to have really transit-oriented corridors.

[03:56:36] We talked about one ad nauseum over the past few weeks of 28. We need to find ways to have dedicated funding for OmniRide and other transit-oriented initiatives. To me, the CNI is that. So to shift away from that, the public assistance initiative that you have in a couple of slides.

[03:56:57] Yes, that one. Thank you. Understanding that a lot of it is sort of paired with the state and what have you. Frankly, knowing what's going on right now in Washington and knowing that people are actively losing their jobs and knowing there's a little bit of a horizon between now and when people really start to feel the sting of that, do we have any plans on, you know, flexing more folks into certain jobs, being able to keep up with any kind of projected demand that we have right now for additional public assistance moving forward?

[03:57:31] Well, I'll say just because of the nature of this increase that you see in this table, DSS has done just that. They have absolutely surged using temporary staff. And so what we're trying to do is make permanent this investment because we know that there's really a built-in need now.

[03:57:53] And they have certainly at that point where we're getting the kinds of applications and the numbers of applications that is not sustainable for the staff. So I will say that right now what DSS has done is use temporary staff when they receive a surge.

[03:58:12] If we're in a position where the board approves this budget in April, we won't be in a position to fill those positions until July. If we do receive an influx over the next several weeks and months, then we may be in a position where we need to, you know, come back or move funding around to provide for additional support for temporary staff. Sure. More of that later on in the budget cycle. My last question is under the critical needs for IT infrastructure. You know, we're looking at in this year, this fiscal

[03:58:48] year, $7.6 million and so in change of investment, which, like you said, it's substantial, and then $5.2 million plus every year in the next five years. Substantial investments, and I understand why we need to do it. And you said, frankly, it's to help catch up to what we haven't historically done. Alongside these initiatives, are we going to have some kind of way to start really getting a better handle on the life cycles of these subscriptions, the life cycle of the technology. So we're not having to come back every 10 years or so and have these massive $20, $30 million investments over the course of several years. Definitely appreciate

[03:59:28] that question. A few weeks ago, we talked about very publicly creating a steering committee internal to our government to help with monitoring capital project delivery. We have talked about creating the same and already have worked towards creating a similar steering committee made up of across-the-board directors and leaders within the government to help make sure that we are doing the same for IT. And so every agency has its own information technology needs, and so we need to

[04:00:04] make sure that they are involved in the process of evaluating how we are doing around technology and technology investments. So, yes, there will certainly be an extra, as we go forward, especially given these kinds of investments, an extra eye on making sure that our entire enterprise is a part of making smart decisions about the ways that we invest.

[04:00:29] Thank you very much. All right. Angry. Thank you, Madam Chair. Let me just co-sign with everything Supervisor Bode said about the OmniRide and the motorfields tax. i think i've been saying that for about three years now that the well has run dry we need to figure that out so i won't even jump in on that we'll just leave that uh where where it is um i will oh so let's get i'm just really curious about the um the landfill and in the new hours of operation i just want to caution just just i don't know maybe you you've already

[04:01:06] discussed it but our haulers and the trash you know that they come in in the morning i want to make sure as you move that to seven o'clock in the morning that you've all worked with that industry about how those trucks are getting in there and you know one of the things of in the neighborhood was the fact that there's a safety issue kids go to school in the morning people are speeding out the neighborhoods because they're for whatever reason late for work and when you have those trucks moving later in the morning that just creates a area of concern that i'm concerned about with safety so i like hearing them in the morning early i know a lot of people don't but

[04:01:42] But the fact is, they get in, they pick up, they're out, they hit the landfill, they're gone on to the next job. I just want to make sure that we have it. No, definitely, definitely appreciate that, Supervisor. I'll say that this is partially why we want to make sure that we have that six-month lead time so that we can outreach to the impacted industry.

[04:02:04] I'll say that we also have, even with this change, better hours than our landfill neighbors. And I know that Wade will be reaching out to the industry. Even now that we've had this discussion publicly, I think this is my first time saying this out loud, that we would be moving in this direction, that even before this is approved by the board, if it is approved to move forward, we'll be outreaching and meeting with the haulers to get feedback from them so that when we have that budget work session, we're in a position to say we are in touch with the haulers.

[04:02:39] Okay, and I just want to make that an awareness because, you know, you're cutting in my time. You know, I won't go on so long. The senior center without walls, one area I just want to, I don't know if you all have been aware of this, but as you created this budget for the, like there's a transportation issue there that a lot of seniors can't get around to different senior events.

[04:03:04] And so I don't know if that's something we can look at as a county as we move our seniors around from some of our senior centers. senior locations to get them around to these different... So I'm just curious if inside of this budget proposal with senior centers without walls, there could be a transportation element in that.

[04:03:21] So I would just... I don't know what that looks like. I'll kind of investigate that a little bit. But I've heard it from different jurisdictions. I've heard different seniors telling me that, you know, I won't even say localities, but such-and-such has this program, such-and-such has this, and we don't have a transportation program for our seniors around the county.

[04:03:39] So I just want to put that awareness to the board. The last one that I'm just a little bit concerned with that I think should be really a work session for this board, and maybe I'm too far ahead of it. If it's not in this section, I'll move on and won't bring it up now.

[04:03:58] And I think it is not in this section. Oh, it is. Okay. The Director of Transportation and Capital Construction. I really feel like that needs to be a work session for us to hear what that looks like. uh this investment that's slide 37 is that still in the same area i'm still in the same area all right okay i feel like that needs to be a a more robust board conversation i know you spoke a lot about it that you're going to work on this with the team i feel like a work session is is with

[04:04:35] this because this changes a lot of what i know we did coming into this in 2019 to 2020 when we put Matt Villara over some CIP projects and his position over fleet management and some building stuff. So it seems like we're morphing this, and I get it if we have to. I just don't understand.

[04:04:56] So I need to kind of hear more about how we got here, and I feel like that's a board piece. It is absolutely a board piece, but I wouldn't be in a position. I'm not ready to recommend a structure, so I'm not in a position to have a work session with the board.

[04:05:12] What I am doing here is putting essentially the board on notice that this is my intent. And so what I would like to do over the next few months is work with Matt, Seth, Katab, and Rick to make sure that we are smart about how we merge the various programs so that Now we are essentially serving parks and recreation, serving FFM, serving FFM parks and public works, right?

[04:05:45] And that transportation, in addition to being an external facing agency and building roads, they become an internal facing agency as well. And so there is significant work to do. And for me to have conversations with staff internally before I come to the board.

[04:06:04] But I did not want to start doing that without having this action take place first to say that we are all moving in the same direction. And so the point one mill gets us a reclassified.

[04:06:20] So what I'm asking the board to do here, instead of creating a brand new office of capital project delivery, instead doing this in a more efficient way and reclassifying the position, the director of transportation position into a director of transportation and capital construction.

[04:06:41] And to essentially use that position to assist me over this next year in designing the kind of agency that gets us to where we want to be in terms of being prepared to deal with the kinds of construction projects that we are faced with.

[04:07:00] I think about the Judicial Center Expansion Project and all of the funding that will go to that over the next 10 years. We need to be a county that does those kinds of projects. I even think about the government-centered project that we're about to get started in the next few years.

[04:07:16] Multi-billion-dollar project. I want to be in a position to recommend to you how we do that as an organization in a way that is not out of the ordinary, that we are fully capable of it. All right. Thanks. I don't want to eat in, but thank you for that.

[04:07:31] Supervisor Bailey? Thank you, Madam Chair. Correct. Thank you so much. uh chris i'm i'm wondering on uh for the the domestic violence programming under on page 19 and 20 and the domestic violence coordinator that's one in the same correct the program and having a coordinator over it yes for on page 19 where you where it says community safety domestic violence programming yes and then on the next page it says uh domestic violence coordinator i I appreciate that question.

[04:08:10] So, no. With CJS, the domestic violence coordinator is court-ordered. So this is essentially a judge ordering. Okay. Yeah. And here we are providing services.

[04:08:26] Okay. And so this is for families who might come, for adults, families who may come to us to say, I need help, I need support, but that support is not court-ordered. Well, and I appreciate that. Yes, I appreciate the answer. And I think that's forward thinking because that is a legislative item that was taken forward or bill that was announced in the General Assembly by our own Ian Lovejoy.

[04:08:54] And that's something that will feed that going forward. It's something that was born out of mental health during COVID. And so I appreciate the forward thinking in that. The other thing that I had was on page 21 versus planning office.

[04:09:12] My question there is I appreciate the two FTEs. It seems like we are, for lack of a better word, catching up in our planning office with the level of service that we're, you know, growing out of having a hard time recruiting people.

[04:09:29] Is that the direction, the positive direction that we're going with these two FTEs, you know, the momentum we're trying to get to? Yeah, we're absolutely going in a positive direction. I actually had a chance just this morning to sit with the leadership team in planning and hear from them very directly about all the work that they've done to increase the level of recruitment in the planning office.

[04:09:51] You may recall that not so long ago we were in a position where we couldn't hire planners and senior planners in the planning office. That is no longer the case. We are absolutely filling positions. We are seeing stronger applications come in.

[04:10:08] They've also made some changes through HR to the job announcements and the way that we classify positions where we were requiring certain things in the job announcements that were not really needed. And so they've done just a phenomenal job over the last year to change the recruitment environment in planning.

[04:10:29] And I would venture to say, are those positions on the vacancy list as well? They have filled the six positions that were budgeted for and approved last year. There are now four vacant positions in planning, and I understand that those vacant positions are due to movement where staff essentially were promoted up into the positions that were open.

[04:10:58] So these are not vacant positions that were approved last year, if I'm saying that in a way that you understand it. Yes, yes, yes, yes. Okay, and then with my 1.28, the last thing that I'll say is we appreciate the recommendation for our trip funds from 225 to 450, Because it certainly will help us in terms of heightening the level of service in our districts that's so needed and has been needed for a long time.

[04:11:32] Thank you. That's all I have, Madam Chair. All right. Supervisor Cordy. Thank you, Madam Chair. To go back to the discussion on OmniRide, I do want to say that since return to work, return to office, ridership has skyrocketed.

[04:11:47] So their revenues should be going up on their own. And if they're not, then OmniRide's got a problem and needs to solve that problem. And so I am reluctant to want to go bail them out when ridership is increasing.

[04:12:07] I would rather wait a year to figure out what the net effect of the new policies are in order to figure out how we should be seeking a funding stream. On the CNI tax, I'm still, and I'll keep saying this, I'm worried about the impact of small business because their taxes are already going up because the M2 and M1 land in this county values are being driven up by data centers.

[04:12:34] So to add another tax on top of them at that same value is something that will only serve to continue to undermine our small businesses, and that's something that we'll have to have a very robust discussion about. question on um landfill uh can you speak to the balls ford facility and what changes you foresee and within within that uh the changes with the landfill what are the changes that would happen at balls ford if any i don't think this contemplates any changes to hours of operation or

[04:13:11] or that no uh this proposal is almost exclusively focused on the landfill okay i just want to validate that yep and then this one last question and it's probably just a typo but i don't want to assume anything on the stormwater management fee uh page 30 business and non-residential it looks like it should go up a change of 157 or is the proposed actually reduced um because the

[04:13:43] the same it's the same for the single family but the change is 157 right oh yep that is so i didn't I just want to make sure the proposed 26 isn't different, and it should result in 153. Either way, it's an error and a great catch.

[04:14:01] Either, and we'll do the calculation. Okay. The FY26 proposed rate of 5383 is correct. Supervisor Gordy will make the correct dollar change, if you will.

[04:14:21] Okay. All right. That's all I got. Thank you. Supervisor Weir. Thank you, Madam Chair. If we could go to slide 20.

[04:14:40] So I've been corrected. So Balls Fort, actually the hours will adjust with the landfill. So there will be a change in hours for Balls Fort when the landfill change, hours change. So consistent with? Consistent with. Hallelujah. Thank you. Katal has the magic message.

[04:14:59] Thank you, Katal. All right. Let's delve into the Commonwealth's attorney. You've got 32 FTE up there. Where does that number come from? What is the number, 32? Yeah. It's associated with the staffing plan that we have been working with her on and that the board has approved.

[04:15:20] So that's not the total FTE that she's got in place, correct? No, that is the total number of FTEs we've approved. I'm looking at the compensation board report from January of 2024 regarding FY24.

[04:15:36] I'm looking at our budget book here, the FTE, and quite frankly, the historic numbers. Back in 2024, we had the fifth largest office, only eclipsed by Fairfax, Richmond, Virginia Beach, and Norfolk.

[04:15:54] We're now the second. We've outstripped Fairfax, and she wants more, more, more. And I think her budget request this year was for $35. We've already doubled her budget in the last three years. When are we going to say enough is enough, and she needs to make do with the staff that she's got?

[04:16:13] Everybody else seems to be doing more with less, and we're running a catch-and-release program with more. I want that message delivered and delivered clearly. If she wants more staff, then she needs to do more prosecution. And quite frankly, I'm just not willing to spend exponentially more than Fairfax is, exponentially more than Henrico and the city of Richmond are, because I can't believe that our crime rate is significantly higher than the city of Richmond, Virginia Beach, or Norfolk.

[04:16:48] I'll just leave it at that for the moment on that one. turning to page 21 the planning office we had this discussion last year we added positions to long-range planning and community development planners and now we're adding two more for small area plans yet we have not fixed the problem that we have to deal with which is our run-of-the-mill case planners the ones who are overworked and overloaded our planning staff the one who actually handle the rezotings the comp plan amendments all that wonderful stuff that ends up on our desks

[04:17:26] have four to five times the caseload of our neighboring jurisdictions, and in some cases, 10. I don't want to see another planner go to community planning, small area planning, long-range planning until we fix the problem that we've got, which is our current planning docket, because I don't want another applicant coming in here and waving the one-year rule at us because we're so bogged down we can't get it done, or they're playing the system. We need to prioritize

[04:17:59] this. For my one-eighth, we need to prioritize where we're putting our planning personnel dollars, and I think given our current staffing, given our current caseload, we need to focus it there. I know you're going to have an argument for the other ones in terms of what the county board directives are and small area plans and the need for all of that, but at the end of the day, the things that need to happen first are the handling of the cases that are brought to us by the applicants particularly the rezonings and the cpas which have a time frame on them and i don't want

[04:18:34] to see us get backed into a corner again and it seems to me that given the way things are going right now we're either going to have a 12-hour session of planning cases in the very near future or we're going to have extended meeting after extended meeting after extended meeting because people are going to start pushing their deadlines so i would i would rather see we we get that addressed rather quickly.

[04:19:00] I'll say, Supervisor Weir, I think Director Washington has an amazing story to tell about the work that she's doing at Planning. I look forward to the Q&A session that we will have on April 1st where she'll be able to tell this story very directly. She absolutely knows firsthand what they are doing.

[04:19:19] April 1st. April 1st. Okay, yeah. April 1st does not work within the time frame of the budget. Well, there are a number of touch points that we're going to have in terms of budget work sessions where I'd love to have this conversation about what is happening, the transformation that is happening at Planning.

[04:19:44] And then before I run out of time, I'll take my rest of the tranche later. Just one thing, Americans at Wartime Museum, I understand we're having issues with the property owners, and I'm not real fond of what is essentially an unfunded mandate by the legislators.

[04:20:00] So I'll just leave it at that, and I'll come back to my other ones in a minute. All right, Supervisor Vega. Thank you, Madam Chair. Budget initiatives. Well, I kicked off this discussion by talking about my budget initiatives and priority, and that was to reduce the real estate tax.

[04:20:20] I have other priorities that I want to discuss real quick, but before I do that, Mr. Shorter, I was one of the supervisors that encouraged certain asks for FTEs, if you recall. but I was also very clear in terms of justifying those asks right and so you know to some of the points already raised by my colleagues if we're going to be fulfilling your FTE request I also expect the money that we spend on consultants to drastically drop because I said that that's what I was hoping would happen if we hired more people so that we can rely on our subject matter experts

[04:20:58] instead of constantly having to spend millions of dollars on consultants. And so I'm going to keep pushing for that. So I just wanted to throw that out there as a gentle reminder. And also, Madam Chair, I know that we're supposed to be talking about the tax rate. Mr. Schroeder, this is his proposal to us, but of course now it becomes our budget and we work around it to make sure that we fulfill the priorities of this county.

[04:21:23] and just want to, again, throw this out there that I am going to push for a real estate tax rate of $0.88. I'm going to push for us to eliminate the meals tax, also known as the food and beverage tax, and I hope that this is going to allow for us to lower the personal property tax rate for folks in this county.

[04:21:41] Also, we keep hearing all this chatter about concerns for folks who are already without a job or going to be losing their job, but we cannot in the same breath talk about implementing yet again a new tax, and we cannot in good faith talk about alleviating the burden that folks not just recently have been experiencing, but for a few years now in this county. This is the go-to always, right? We always raise taxes in this county. Whether we want to call it a flat rate or not, we're still raising taxes, making it incredibly difficult for working families to get by and survive in this county. So if we're serious about the cost of living, if we're serious about helping

[04:22:21] our neighbors, we got to be serious about what this budget will reflect when it's all said and done. So to my colleagues, because some expressed wanting to work with my proposal, I do plan on sharing my document with all of you all so that you can consider it, because in it, I also talk about raising the data center rate. We achieve an 88 cent real estate rate by, again, doing a 50-50 split with the schools by raising the data center rate. And I hope that we also greatly consider getting rid of the meals tax because it's a regressive tax that impacts folks that are the

[04:22:56] most vulnerable in our community. And it hinders businesses' abilities to be able to keep their operations going, but not just that, for them to also be able to provide for their families. So those are, Madam Chair, my budget initiatives. And again, I will share all of this with you all where it has the breakdowns as to where we're going to generate revenue. I know that it sounds like we're going to be losing some, but we're not if we do it right, and I look forward to collaborating with my colleagues. Thank you. Supervisor Franklin? Yeah, just I guess to start with the food and beverage tax, and I don't know if Nikki is here, and certainly I don't think Glenn is, but I know one of my questions was if we can push for some type of clarification or at

[04:23:35] least exemption or waiver into the types of businesses that would have to share their revenue or pay into the food and beverage tax. Do we know if there was any type of movement? I heard about some type of study that may be considered to look into that.

[04:23:53] Do we know if any of that happened in Richmond this session so far? I do not, but we certainly can develop that as one of the responses. Yes, certainly, because I think one of the challenges always was about some of the mom-and-pop shops or restaurants that would have to pay into it.

[04:24:09] We know that it's essentially the customers that end up paying it, But certainly my question has always been seeking some type of waiver exemption for those type of restaurants. So I would love to just get some type of feedback. I don't think anything has happened in Richmond, but it would be helpful just to know.

[04:24:27] So just going kind of back in the order that I had written down, are we whole now with the EMT medical supplies discussion? We don't need to deal with that in this budget, do we? Pharmacy, the pharmacy program. Correct. We are whole. Okay, good. We are whole. So that decision has been made.

[04:24:42] Fire and Rescue has absolutely done the work of transferring that service now. There is obviously some work that still remains, but we are well on our way in not asking for additional funding in the FY26 budget.

[04:24:58] Yeah, and do we know if the feds ever changed their positioning on this long term? Because I don't want us to take our attention off of that. They need to do their jobs just as well as we are. I have to follow up with you.

[04:25:15] I think there has been some movement. I think some jurisdictions that were a little less prepared for this transition made the case both at the state and federal level. I just need to follow up to find out where those conversations went.

[04:25:31] That said, our investment is one that almost can't be pulled back. I mean, we've bought the equipment. We've worked to make sure that that equipment is installed. And we've done the training at Fire and Rescue. But that said, I will provide a response on where the federal and state discussions have gone.

[04:25:52] Sure, because even 10 years from now, I mean, I still think that it will be helpful for us to be able to operate as we were previously. So I think it's still important to keep on the feds on that particular issue. Also, you know, we talked about Omnirot funding.

[04:26:08] Obviously, locally, we'll continue to do our part and, you know, look at various alternatives for how we can support long-term funding for transportation. But, again, we'll always just push for the state to kind of do their part.

[04:26:24] And I know that they have had discussions. I know Vivian Watts has been working very hard and others on our transportation committee to figure out solutions for our local transportation departments. but let's not put the onus completely on locals. Let's make sure that our General Assembly, which I know that they will be supportive of, and the governor is working towards helping us find long-term solutions as well.

[04:26:50] And then, you know, we had a discussion, you know, you asked about can we transport seniors to various events. We do have a Wheels to Wellness program that transports seniors over a certain age towards medical appointments. i'm not sure how well that program is doing maybe we can get a brief overview at some point during your county exec time but you know if we have capacity in that program maybe that satisfies what supervisor angry was asking about and then lastly the wartime memorial unless i'm completely mistaken it's my understanding that the state was willing to put in money so long as the county was

[04:27:26] so so to call it an unfunded mandate i'm not sure if that's completely accurate all right we're gonna All right, let's move forward.

[04:27:48] Happy to make a directive if necessary. Supervisor Angry. Thank you, Madam Chair. So just kind of going through the priority list, I mean, I'll just, I'm going to start with, I 100% support us trying to decouple that whole C&P tax and pulling out the, you know, personal property from the C&P because, you know, I hear my colleague out, but I'm not interested in raising CMP tax.

[04:28:20] I am interested in trying to have a solution and help out the used vehicle tax, and I believe that is our best area where we can do some effectiveness, even to the point I know people are going to have taxes, and we're never going to have zero taxes, but whatever we can do to help offset some of those taxes, I'm very much interested in for the people.

[04:28:41] I just, I'm concerned if we keep lowering residential taxes, I want to find out what that magic number is for we can comfortably sit there and then try to do other things to help out our constituents. And, you know, one thing I want, I always talk about the backstory, so I'm going to go there because it really, it's a lot for me, you know, and it's my concerns with even our collective bargaining agreement, and I'm going to speak to you all, the board, because supervisor gordy asked questions about retention and fire and rescue and really retention throughout our kind of position but i'm going to speak specifically to fire and rescue because if you

[04:29:19] weren't here you will forget the story and you should know the history of this and we went from a 48-hour work week to a 56-hour work week based on what an association because you know many people don't want to own up how we got there but we got there through this fight if you will and we went there and then we bought in collective bargaining and then we hid moving down to a 50-hour work week hiring 90 more people with a budget if you want to talk about budget supervisor where you need to look and see the increase in our fine rescue system which I really feel we need to have a

[04:29:55] real conversation on this board about what that looks like and how we manage that that's a huge dent to our revenue in this budget that we're proposing just alone and collective bargaining There's an $8.2 million, I believe, $8.3 million, I think it was.

[04:30:12] That's a huge, $8.3 million, that's a huge chunk. It affects everyone's budget throughout the Commonwealth who has instituted a collective bargain. Now, I can't say that because I'm the one that made the motion to approve it. And I understand why that affects different other areas, and so I agree with that.

[04:30:29] But I do feel that there is a lot going on here inside of how we got here in a fire and rescue. And I'll be very specific about it because I support all of my firefighters. Heck, I am one, or I was one. I could do that again tomorrow. But my point here is this is not how we do this.

[04:30:45] And this is a huge piece, and there's a better way to do that. And I'm speaking specifically to this board and how we manage this because that is something I want to definitely make sure we take a look at holistically. That's it for me. I'm done. Thank you, Madam Chair. All right, Supervisor Bailey.

[04:31:02] Thank you, Madam Chair. What did I have? Chris, on page 26 for the homeless services, the four FTEs that you've proposed to us here, this is in the discussion that for Elijah's program for the homeless, this is in compatibility with that, correct?

[04:31:26] It is included. So if you're talking about the mobile that we absorbed, this is included. The street outreach will absorb that work. So, yes, Vice Chair.

[04:31:43] Okay, good. And then I really, 27, I appreciate you really elevating the senior center without walls. Because, again, as you said, the increase is, I thought it was 300, but it's 400%.

[04:31:59] We have active seniors, and we do need to address their needs and focus on them a little bit more. So I appreciate what you have here in terms of the two FTEs. Then the other thing, it was another thing that I wanted to, I think I'm good.

[04:32:18] Oh, the last thing that I wanted to ask you about, I know that the Environmental Sustainability Department, there were phases that they were escalating to support the sustainability master plan that we had.

[04:32:37] So is this a part of that additional phase? This is a part of that. So we are absolutely in alignment with the Sustainability Master Plan and investing in these FTEs. I'm sure I'll go to the page.

[04:32:54] Yeah, there we go. You got it? Yes. So now we have a long way to go there. I will be the first to admit. But this is certainly in terms of FTEs in the office's capacity to deliver, this will absolutely go a long way.

[04:33:12] And then lastly, I just want on page 31, I appreciate also, I think we've done really good in terms of voting, a voting process and how we've escalated that.

[04:33:29] And with the new equipment that you're talking about, with the new technology, can you just kind of elaborate on that as well? Because I love the fact that it's going to have ADA compliance. I think that's very key because we have older equipment.

[04:33:45] What's the impotence behind that? Right. So the voting equipment that is used at the precinct, which is, I couldn't remember the term precinct when I was presenting. It's precinct. Precinct, yes. The voting equipment that is currently used at the precinct is just outdated.

[04:34:01] So we are 10 years in. Many of our counties, the elections offices are going through this procurement process together. So VACO reached out to me maybe four or five months ago to ask the question, is Prince William County also updating and replacing its voting equipment?

[04:34:21] Because many of the other jurisdictions are as well. So this equipment will do what modern day equipment does. It will tell voters, this is how you voted. It will essentially print them a receipt.

[04:34:36] You could see it sort of real time. I'm sure Eric Olson will be prepared if there are questions. He actually might be here, but certainly when we do the Q&A, I think he'd probably love to talk about the equipment and what we will get with this investment.

[04:34:54] Yeah, I think that would be good for us to kind of hear and see if there's demonstrations or presentations so we could really understand that the investment is critical. And then lastly, I have one more question under communications on page 32.

[04:35:11] The language access coordination, that's so needed. Is that enhancing in different languages? What is that? Right now, individual agencies, some do better than others in terms of what we have done to provide and make sure that we are able to provide services to residents, visitors, those doing business in the county that speak a different language.

[04:35:44] Some agencies, especially the smaller ones, don't have the capacity to do that. What we're trying to do here is make sure all of the tools that we use, especially county-wide, that we are translating properly, that the website, that all of the social media platforms that we use, that folks who want to engage with us may not speak English as a first language, can engage with us. This is assisting agencies to make sure that language access is a priority,

[04:36:23] and it's also helping to make sure that through the communications office that we are doing what we can on the major platforms that we use. I think equity and inclusion is going to play a role here in making sure that there are standards in place that agencies could go by in terms of making sure that we are providing a standardized approach to language access services.

[04:36:47] Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair. Supervisor Ware. Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm going to run through these real quick. For my 1-8th additional memberships in the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority, no. The last thing we need to do is join yet another multi-jurisdictional body that's going to advocate its interests and not ours, but want to do it on our dime.

[04:37:10] Remember, Fairfax has already put a claim into our recordation fuels and T.O.T. taxes. Recordation and T.O.T. taxes, I'm concerned that you've got too many masters for them and we're not going to be able to fund them all. You know, we're talking about tourism, potentially WMATA, OmniRide, Americans at Wartime Museum, and I would argue that unless the legislature is going to give us the additional $2.5 million, Yeah, it is unfunded mandate.

[04:37:41] You know, you're talking about increasing our trips from the recordation fund. I am simply concerned that at some point in time that those revenue sources are not going to be sufficient. I haven't touched on the crisis receiving center.

[04:37:57] I'm going to touch on it very briefly. One of my favorite quotes, hope is not a strategy. There's a different administration that took office last month. I don't think we know what's going to happen. And to suggest that we're hopeful is one thing, but I think we need to have a strategy in place beyond year one, especially given the direction the administration is going.

[04:38:23] We need to prepare to eat some significant unreimbursed costs for a long period of time, and they may be very, very painful. It's not that I want that, not that I'm advocating it. I'm just looking at it from a realistic standpoint.

[04:38:41] Get to page 33, the PD vehicles you want to pay out of the capital reserve. Why? I mean, we had this question with the fire department. Have we exhausted all of our PD proffers?

[04:38:57] I mean, those are for capital improvements, and vehicles are capital improvements. Are we, are we, I think we need a policy change when it comes to capital purchases, that the first bucket we look at is the proper bucket. Empty that out first before we start delving into reserves or general fund dollars.

[04:39:17] Sure. Yep. I know that we certainly just a few weeks ago had a conversation around proffers, and the chair just made the comment that she did around using proffers. And certainly I'm up for that conversation throughout this process. We use the capital reserve for one-time funding, and this is certainly one-time funding, critical funding to replace 35 vehicles.

[04:39:36] If there is another source, I would not recommend that we take this out of the general fund. But if there is another source that the board would prefer, then certainly we will take the board's direction i hope i hope the county attorney will correct me if i'm wrong but uh police department proffers are designed for capital expenditures capital expenditures only we can't use them for operational costs so they are designated for what are in essence one time one time purchases of either capital equipment or capital facilities um so you know rather than dipping into the reserve for the police vehicle replacement uh it would seem to me that that is

[04:40:16] like one of the principal functions of the proper funds is to do vehicle replacement i've done this in other jurisdictions and they program them out years in advance what the proffers are going to be used for and most often when it comes to pd proffers they are used for vehicle replacement on a schedule um looking at the five-year plan i'm concerned about the growth in the spending

[04:40:46] you know i just over that short period i'm seeing a 20 growth and i just i just don't know that that's going to be sustainable um you know when it comes to start when we start talking about vehicle taxes um in order to cut the vehicle tax something else is going to have to get raised that's the stark reality of it um i'm willing to do it with the computer and peripherals tax if It'll give the vehicle owners a break.

[04:41:18] We've underwritten the industry for far too long, in my mind, and it's time to get some bang for the buck. And one last thing, I know the volunteers aren't going to want to hear this, but in my view, the use of the fire levy has been abused and changed over the last 10 years to the point where it no longer serves the purpose it was supposed to serve or what it's legislatively mandated to serve.

[04:41:42] So I would rather drop the fire levy, add it to the total tax, and then carve out a portion to the fire department. Let's be honest to everybody what their actual tax rate is. Because right now we're telling you their tax rate is X, but their tax rate is really X plus the fire levy plus the mosquito levy.

[04:41:58] No other jurisdiction does that. Let's be up front with them, tell them how much it is, and just give them the flat total, and my five minutes is up. All right, I'm going to take my quick, some of these are just comments, so don't need to go to the slides.

[04:42:15] I do want to highlight our partnership, and I'm very proud of our partnership with Northern Virginia Community College. You know, for students who are concerned about debt or for students who want to learn a trade, this is an effective way for them to do it. I want to talk about safe and secure community for one second.

[04:42:32] I really appreciate, you know, I know it is going to come at a cost, but I appreciate looking at fire and rescue, giving that 50-hour work schedule. I am really proud of that because it's going to improve their quality of life, and it's going to help us with recruitment and retention of our first responders.

[04:42:50] On page 20, I noticed we didn't have anything for the public defender. Last year she only had one request, so I'm making a mental note with myself to follow up with her to see if she does have additional needs for her department that we haven't had a chance to address.

[04:43:08] I did want to just mention for the planning department, I think that was a good question the Supervisor Bailey had asked, and I appreciate Supervisor Rear's comments about workloads for current planning. You know, I think this is an area of a department that we definitely could see growth.

[04:43:28] Maybe, you know, and I'm open to having discussions with my colleagues and with the planning office if, you know, if there's a way that we can do more than two because, again, we have so many cases coming ahead of us. On page 23, just quickly, thank you, Supervisor Gordy, for noting ridership.

[04:43:46] You took that question right out of my head. um for landfill you know just a weekend hour 7 a.m to 4 p.m i'm an early bird i will be there at seven i don't know how many people would be there i don't know if it's worth looking at different hours for the weekend um and then i think my i'm going to page 29 i do have a question i just want to make sure more of a comment it doesn't have to be answered right now for service expansion for parks i just want to make sure it includes extended hours at Veterans Park for our swimmers. You know, we had the Ocotuan Swim Club come

[04:44:25] in, and I know there's also another swim club that is really interested. You know, they brought their swimmers. These young kids were very eloquent. I just wanted to make sure that this included extended outwards for Veteran Park. It does not, but we will certainly take...

[04:44:43] I was waiting for that dramatic entrance. It does not, yeah. So, what we'll do, like everything else we're hearing, we will, we are bringing together a list of items of board interest. I believe that we will be in a position over the next few weeks to come back and fund things that the board prioritizes and that certainly I heard from them as well and know that Seth and the team put forward a proposal and so we'll be prepared to have that discussion. And we are going to go into our final, we're going to talk about budget summary and public engagement. I know we bounced around a little and people talked about tax rates. I just had one quick question So you can clarify for all of us.

[04:45:24] When is it that we have to make the decision to publicly advertise our tax rates? What date is that? In fact, Dave, you want to. We were in years past. I would have been tonight saying that I really would love the board's guidance on advertising tax rates.

[04:45:46] And to be honest, I would love the board's guidance tonight on advertising. But there has been a change in Virginia Code that allows for a little more time. But I'll let Dave read from what we have. So there's multiple advertisements that need to occur.

[04:46:05] The primary one pertaining to the real estate tax rate is called the Notice of Real Property Tax Rate Increase. That used to be a 30-day requirement prior to the public hearing, the formal public hearing in April. That is no longer the case.

[04:46:22] However, there are separate advertisements that must occur. It can't be advertised on the same date as the summary of the budget and the other tax rates and fees. So our plan would be to advertise the notice of real property tax increase in the newspaper on Thursday, March 20th.

[04:46:44] That means we would need to get the ad to the newspaper no later than Wednesday, March 12th. in order to make that march 20 print run in the local newspaper now to well to to be clear though um our goal always is to make sure that we are advertising at the highest rate and knowing that we could potentially come down from that rate so if the board is in a position this evening i'm gonna i know i was joking about it a few seconds ago but if the board is in a position

[04:47:21] this evening to give some guidance. We are certainly here for that guidance. If the board would prefer to do this on another evening, then I think we have a little more flexibility this year than we have in years past. I think we're going to need a little more time at arm wrestle. My only concern is obviously I wish we had our budget committee meeting before then because it's going to be on March 25th. So yes, sir. I just go one step further. Our plan was to advertise the annual budget and other tax rates and fees um in the newspaper on thursday march 27th we would need

[04:47:59] to get that to the newspaper no later than wednesday march 19th madam chair quickly then i have bodie so looking um at our calendar we have our next meeting march 4th we have a work session march 11th and then for the first ask of advertisement that deadline um we would not meet that because our last meeting is March 18th. So when are we going to have this discussion as a board?

[04:48:27] We can, I mean, again, we are entering that section where we can start having this discussion and start bantering. Supervisor Bodie. That's a work session. We do, but it's already pretty. Our meeting next week is the one, it's the makeup, it's the work session from the 11th, which we canceled because of weather.

[04:48:52] I mean, I do not have a problem tonight just kind of I mean you've thrown out a few numbers we're not going to agree but for people want to kind of talk about some numbers because there has been a few emails flying back and forth about tax rates and I mean we can do but we still the 25th of the problem is are you talking about 25th?

[04:49:12] Oh is that the 25th? All right I'm going to go over to Supervisor Bodie real quick but if people do have ideas let's throw them out. Sure if I can just real quick so in terms of work sessions I want to the board can give us guidance whenever you decide to give us guidance. It could be very much at a work session. This is not formal action. Madam Chair, there's nothing that precludes us from voting on something at a work session simply because we call it a work session. No, I'm just saying I don't think there's anything that precludes us, but I at least want to hear some numbers from folks and see where people are thinking. So, Supervisor Bode, we've been impinging on your precious time.

[04:49:43] No worries. Just very quickly before I talk about that, a lot of things that I think are where you discussed, you know, folding in fire levy, some of the other things, I think are perfect topics for the Budget and Finance Committee to talk about moving forward. So just wanted to say that. In terms of numbers, I'm going to go on record that I agree with us looking at the vehicle tax, but I will say I agree with us actually looking at raising the computer peripherals tax for data centers to help begin to offset that, because I know we're still pretty far below a bunch of our neighboring jurisdictions, knowing that there's numbers I have to look at in order to make that equalize. But for my one-eighth, I would love for us to look at relieving folks of

[04:50:21] the car tax at least somewhat because we know that that's one universally everyone talks to us about every single year so i would love for us to look at decoupling it lowering the vehicle tax and raising computer and peripheral tax to help begin making up that that difference there so that's my 1a there um in terms of of everything else you know i know folks some folks really want to start want to eliminate the the uh the meals tax outright i'm still resistant to do that immediately because we talked a lot about diversification of revenues. I get that it pinches some folks and some businesses out there are sort of struggling with it. At the same time,

[04:51:00] it's one of the only sources of revenue we have. It has a significant portion of it that's paid, at least in some parts of the county, by outside folks. 25% upwards in some parts of the county. It's paid for by folks that don't even live in Prince William County. So before we rush to get rid of that. I'd rather have us look at other tax that we know is almost entirely paid for by our taxpayers, vis-a-vis the vehicle tax, before we start looking to whittle away and eliminate the meal tax. Now, I'm open for us to talking about phasing it out over a number of years, but to me, I would much rather look at some of these other taxes first to lower the vehicle tax and look at

[04:51:38] commiserate increases, the computer and peripherals tax, to look at that. I'm still going to go back to it, I still believe we have to look at that C&I tax. I know that there's concerns about small businesses, but we also know based on our own data that a bigger and bigger proportion every year of that tax is paid for, again, by data centers. We know that. Would love for us to talk about getting exemptions from the state on that, us being able to be more creative with it, but again, I'm going to go back to C&I tax as another way for us to really fund public transportation. I hear you on return to work um and that's going to boost revenues for omni ride but we still have a

[04:52:14] significant portion of folks that need to be transported around the county and right now those trips are completely free and part of that is because those are lifeline trips that people need to get to the doctor get to the grocery store get to to work in some cases if they work within the county or within the two cities um to me again if we're gonna have conversations about being a truly transit-oriented community that really looks to make transit a bleeding edge of what we do versus an afterthought after we build roads, we really need to start having dedicated funding to transit and transportation. So that's my biggest thing. Like I said, I'm reticent to

[04:52:54] lower other taxes before we look at decoupling the personal property, lowering the vehicles, raising computer and peripherals. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you so very much. I'm just also going to do, you're the last one. If there's, okay, see Gordy, if there's a last call, I'm going to make this also just a last call before we close out. So Gordy, it's on you. Yeah, I'll just reiterate, I've been on the record many times wanting to begin the phasing out and elimination eventually of the meals tax. I'm actually meeting with the Virginia Restaurant Association on Friday

[04:53:33] because, you know, this continues to be, as Supervisor Vega said, it is a regressive tax, and it goes after the tips. The ones who are getting hit the worst are those who earn tips because the tips are going to the tax, and so they're not getting the income.

[04:53:54] So going after that, I'm fully in favor of raising the C&P tax to bring it more in line with other jurisdictions and using that to help us provide tax relief to our residents and on the OmniRide I would just only add is we do build those activity centers. We should consider since they become more intense users of county services having a certain district tax that helps fund some of those

[04:54:27] services that only they really are using. So that's one of the things I would look at as well is trying to figure out how, as we do create those zones, because if OmniRide is not going to charge people to ride the bus, and these new neighborhoods we're talking about, these are not poor folks going to be moving into these houses or into these apartments that are going to be $2,000, $3,000 a month at a starting price. So I think they can afford to pay, and we're actually going to be reducing the parking in some of this area so um and with the intent of trying to drive

[04:55:03] to that so i think we omni ride does need to look at charging folks to ride the bus um in certain areas so um i don't i just don't think very few i mean you go to new york city you pay to ride the bus um everywhere i've been if i've ridden the bus i paid to ride the bus uh so uh that's just something that we're going to have to look at a new approach and because our county just can't keep taking on the burden of funding all these programs for free when not everybody who's writing it is

[04:55:36] impoverished. So those are my views in looking at the opportunities to see how we can continue to provide balance between what our priorities are and ensuring that this is an affordable county to live in. Thank you, Madam Chair. Supervisor Angry. Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm just starting there because the question is, is the investment worth the buck? Because you have to re-outfit the buses, re-outfit.

[04:56:02] There's a cost associated with talking about charging local services. So we went down this road before, and now we'll just simply tell this board we can go down it again. We should measure the cost of what it costs to get there, the outfit to do this, and what is the gain from that. And if that gain isn't anything, then I don't think that's the smart investment for that.

[04:56:21] But that's something to look into. I will simply say that. I'm going to say again and reiterate my position. And, you know, I am not looking to decouple the C&P so we can raise, you know, data center taxes. I'm looking to allow an opportunity so we can really make a true investment in our citizens by helping with the used car tax.

[04:56:46] And the fact that I didn't understand how those two got coupled together anyway, But if we can separate those to me, that makes the most sense because we can do the greater good with helping our citizens with that. To the wartime museum, I am 150% in support of that 2.5 mil that we have matched to the state's 5 million.

[04:57:09] I understand there are some issues. I'm hoping those issues we will find out before we get the budget recap if those are worked out. I think that is the simple game changer that we are waiting to find out where we go with that. So until then, I like it there.

[04:57:24] I want to see it there, and I'm hoping that all parties can work out whatever these issues are that they have, and we can get to that. So I'm excited about this budget process. I know it's ours now. I have a lot of things that I'm going to be looking at and discussing with the board, and hopefully we can come back and have an easy discussion about approving FI 26 budget.

[04:57:48] So thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you so very much. And again, this is the last call, last call, last call, last call. All right. I'm just going to say this quickly. Board members, we have a lot of discussion. This kicks off our budget season. If you would like to email everyone on the board, please put everyone in the BCC line.

[04:58:07] I don't know if you guys have noticed. That's what I do. I put our chief of staff in the CC line. But no, I just, I'm sorry, like I'm just saying, so we all have guidelines. I don't want, there will be no lawsuits, no nothing, hopefully, okay? We're transparent, but, you know, for the sake, no one can email everyone.

[04:58:27] Move to adjourn. Hold on. No, we ain't adjourning yet. You were quiet. And you gave me two seconds. All right, we, again, look forward to a robust discussion. I almost want to talk longer now, just because you said something. um but whatever i'll go ahead madam chair in all seriousness because this is a serious matter i would appreciate my colleagues sending me their thoughts and their suggestions because only supervisor bode gave somewhat of an indication of what he wanted so that we can actually collaborate and have it figured out before our next meeting thank you that is fair i will give you a quick

[04:59:03] you know i looking forward to having a robust discussion over taxes i do appreciate looking at the vehicle tax. Now that it's decoupled, I'd like to see what kind of tax relief we can offer. However, we also have to make up for any lost revenue, and with that, I'd like to move. Thank you. Second.

[04:59:21] All right. Let's go ahead and vote.

[04:59:31] I think that's a sign from above. There you go. It's not showing on my screen. Okay, she's not. No, I'm about to reach over.

[04:59:49] Thank you. Thank you, everyone. Our next meeting is on Tuesday, February 25th. That is the meeting that we are making up for the February 11th meeting. I know we're adjourned. Goodbye.

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