Special Interests: Alive and Well in Arlington County!
When we growled on Tuesday, February 16, we noted that in introducing the proposed FY 2011 budget, the Acting County Manager said it would result in a real estate tax rate of $0.942 per $100 of assessed value, which is up from the current rate of $0.875, an increase of 7.66% in the real estate tax rate.
After pointing out the Manager precisely followed the budget guidance provided last fall, the Arlington County Board voted to advertise a real estate tax rate this morning of $0.965 per $100 of assessed valuation this morning, an increase of 10.3% (corrected 2/22/10). However, several affordable housing groups, primarily, attended this morning’s Board meeting to lobby the Board to advertise a real estate tax rate of $0.972 per $100. The Board's initial resolution would have raised the rate to $0.962. To accomodate a later vote to increase the stormwater rate from $0.01 to $0.013 per $100, the Board voted to advertise a real estate tax rate of $0.965.
As the county’s press release points out, “By law, the Board cannot adopt a rate higher than the one advertised, although it may adopt a lower rate.”
Why did the Board advertise the higher rate? According to the press release:
“This rate provides us the flexibility we need to address the unknowns presented since our budget guidance was provided in the fall – primarily the uncertain state budget cuts and Metro demands that we may face,” said Arlington County Board Chairman Jay Fisette.”
In adopting the budget in April, the Board could “pay for” those “uncertain state budget cuts” and “Metro demands” by further reducing expenditures in the county’s budget or reducing the amount transferred to the schools. But then that would require the popinjays on the Board to make some hard choices, and heaven knows, taxpayers can’t expect that. Guess “flexibility” can now be added to the liberal lexicon.
UPDATED (2/22/10). Here is the link to Scott McCaffrey's story about the County Board's budget actions on Saturday in the online Arlington Sun Gazette. My apologies for incorrectly computing the percentage as 11.6%.