Albemarle residents criticize proposal to raise tax rates

A sea of orange posters with the words, “think outside the tax box,” were waived as residents spoke Wednesday night against a proposed real-estate tax increase in Albemarle County.

Yet, others who spoke at the public hearing pleaded for the Board of Supervisors to adequately fund education, transit and other services.

Residents overflowed from seats on Wednesday, lining the walls of the county auditorium and seeping into its balcony. A large portion of residents criticized a proposal in the county executive’s budget recommendation to raise the real-estate tax rate by 5.7 cents per $100 of assessed value.

County Executive Robert W. Tucker Jr. has presented a $307.7 million budget recommendation for fiscal 2010, which is about $26 million lighter than the current budget and calls for the county’s 71-cent tax rate to jump to 76.7 cents.

Because assessed property values have declined, the average homeowner would pay the same real-estate taxes this year as last year if the Board of Supervisors raises the tax rate to 74.2 cents.

The Board of Supervisors, however, asked Tucker to create a budget proposal that would add another 2.5 cents on the tax rate to use if economic conditions worsen.

Many residents said that now is not the time to raise taxes. Some said that the economic downturn has already made it difficult to pay their bills, and a tax increase would only set them further back.

Resident Claude Monger said that he’s had to live within his financial means his entire life but the county won’t pledge to do the same.

“I will not continue to be able to live here if fundamental changes aren’t made,” Monger said. “There’s no way my salary can keep up with your … appetite for taxes.”

More than 100 people attended a “pizza and root beer” party before the hearing — the second gathering of its kind hosted by the Albemarle Truth in Taxation Alliance — mocking Board Chairman David L. Slutzky, who once said a tax increase would mean residents would have to sacrifice a pizza and a beer per month.

“I just plain don’t have it,” one resident said of the additional money he’d have to pay under the tax increase, adding that he’s making less money and paying more in insurance premiums.

Others said that their business revenues have declined and their retirement funds have become depleted, making it difficult to pay their bills.

“Don’t balance the budget on the back of the people you see standing behind me,” said Keith Drake, chairman of the taxation alliance, as dozens in the audience stood on his behalf.

Steven Gissendanner, the president of the Albemarle Education Association, said that the county has operated on “a lean budget” and that the education funding cannot afford to be cut further.

He said the county is already shy of meeting its goals for the number of police officers. Others pushed for funding for the county’s program to acquire land conservation easements, which would receive several hundreds of thousands of dollars less in taxpayers’ money under Tucker’s plan.

Tucker’s proposal is designed to guide the Board of Supervisors as its members create a budget in April and set tax rates.

Tucker’s budget is online at www.albemarle.org. The Board of Supervisors will host another public hearing on April 1.

The value of the average single-family residence is down 4.1 percent and the county will have to fork over $4.4 million more this year than last, under a revenue-sharing agreement with Charlottesville.

Despite the real-estate tax rate increase, the county would still have to make vast cuts to services, including freezing 50 county employee positions by the end of January 2010, cutting spending in county departments and delaying infrastructure projects, in addition to providing no salary increases to county employees.