Albemarle supervisors may head in new direction

The day after his fellow Republicans swept the competitive races for the Albemarle County Board of Supervisors, Kenneth C. Boyd was not gloating.

In a board meeting that lasted all day on Wednesday, Boyd patiently listened to reports of dire economic conditions and jabs by his colleagues at the promises made by victorious Republican candidates Duane Snow and Rodney S. Thomas.

Thomas defeated one-term incumbent Democrat David L. Slutzky and Snow won the open seat race in the Samuel Miller District over Democrat Madison Cummings and Independent John Lowry. Both winners are local businessmen born and raised in Charlottesville-Albemarle.

The election results will bring a new mix of experience, politics and philosophy to the board starting in January. That could mean big changes in the board’s approach to budgeting, tax rates, economic development and other key issues.

Degree of change

“I don’t know how much it will change,” said Boyd after a grim work session on the county’s five-year financial plan. “When you run one way, then get elected, you are faced with certain realities once you are on the board. Running for election is different from actually legislating.”

“Even people with experience in the community get faced with having to make fiscal decisions, and it can be different on the inside than from the outside looking in,” said Boyd.

Jack Marshall, president of Advocates for a Sustainable Albemarle Population, said that he thought the election would bring significant changes.

“In the last 20 years, there has been a natural tension on the board, between those that subscribe to a traditional strategy — constant growth is good, we always need to attract new businesses — and a newer strategy, that a community should seek a sustainable level of economic development that over the long haul doesn’t disrupt our environment and quality of life,” Marshall said. “Last week’s election pretty clearly shifted the balance toward the more pro-growth approach.”

Budgeting approaches

Thomas and Snow both indicated in their campaigns that zero-based budgeting process would be part of their approach to cutting government expenses and avoiding tax increases.

After the election, both Thomas and Snow said the budget and economic development remained at the top of their priority lists.

“My priority is the budget. We now have a $5.7 million deficit [in this fiscal year],” said Thomas. “We have to start cutting expenses because we don’t have any money and it is not getting any better.”

Boyd, Snow and Thomas all say they believe zero-based budgeting could improve the county’s financial position.

“Instead of staff coming back with budget recommendations [to the board], department heads would build their budgets from the bottom up,” Boyd said. “One advantage of zero-based budgeting is that instead of staff making decisions about what is essential, the board is forced to do that.”

Snow said when requests for money are made, “we need to have [staff] justify that expense. You have to be prepared to say why you need it and what will happen if you don’t get it.”

Jeff Werner, a land use field officer for the Piedmont Environmental Council, said that zero-based budgeting was going to force some tough choices at the board level.

“In the past it has been easy for some of the supervisors to say they support various initiatives, but that they also want to cut taxes,” said Werner. “It is going to require them to take very specific positions on the things they want to cut and I think that will be very interesting.”

Cuts vs. taxes

The Board of Supervisors that meets in January will start with four votes opposed to any increase of Albemarle’s current 74.2-cent real estate property tax rate. The three Republicans and Dem-ocrat Lin-dsay Dorrier all say they are currently opposed to a staff proposal to increase the rate by 3 cents and maintain that rate for the next five years.

“I don’t want to increase the tax rate at all,” said Thomas. “I would rather look at where we can save some money and programs that we can cut out of the budget. Maybe in the police department, but I don’t have all the facts yet.”

Boyd said he would like to keep the tax rate the same.

“Everybody I know, in business and personally, is having to cut back. Until we reach the point where we are having to sacrifice critical services, I wouldn’t be willing to raise that rate.”

The majority of today’s board, however, has given County Executive Robert W. Tucker Jr. direction to pencil in the higher tax rate to prepare a draft five-year financial plan.

At the meeting Wednesday, staff reiterated that a 77.2-cent rate would mean the average homeowner would pay the same real-estate taxes as this year because of declining property values. The board is expected to approve a five-year financial plan in December. In April, the new Board of Supervisors will set a final tax rate for calendar year 2010.

In the work session Wednesday, the board received new financial projections and learned that the current fiscal year revenues were now $5.7 million below what was budgeted. Second, they were warned that a 74.2-cent tax rate would not even cover the costs to service existing debt in the next capital budget.

Economic development

With this election, the next Board of Supervisors can be expected to bring economic development center stage as one tool they will propose to use to improve the county’s fiscal health. In their campaigns, both Thomas and Snow emphasized the need to attract new businesses to the community with more specific economic development plans.

“The entire culture needs to be changed to be more business friendly. We are open for business,” said Thomas. “We need to attract more businesses to Albemarle County … and I am not speaking of commercial or retail businesses, I am primarily talking about businesses that can hire significant numbers of people.”

Thomas said he was interested in creating new locations for light industrial businesses and that he was open to discussing the Yancey Mills Business Park proposal in Crozet’s rural area.

Snow said he wanted to focus on the county’s economic development plans, with a focus on development within the designated growth areas.

“We should come up with a system where we facilitate and help [business] rather than drag our feet. There is a problem,” said Snow. “It will be a team effort, I am not coming in with both guns blazing. It will take a mentality of all of us working together.”

Charlottesville Tomorrow is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization covering land-use and transportation issues in Charlottesville and Albemarle County.