Board of Supervisors Budget Public Hearing (CY 21 Tax Rate and FY 22 Proposed Budget)   4/28/2021

Good evening everyone.

I call the Albemarle County Board of Supervisors to order for April 28, 2021 6 p.m.

meeting.

This meeting is being held pursuant to and in compliance with ordinance number 20-A16, an ordinance to ensure the continuity of government during the COVID-19 disaster.

The supervisors who are electronically present at this meeting are Supervisor Liz Palmer of the Samuel Miller District,

Supervisor Donna Price of the Scottsville District, Supervisor Diantha McKeel of the Jack Jouett District, Supervisor Ann Mallek of the White Hall District, Supervisor Bea LaPisto-Kirtley of the Rivanna District, and myself, Supervisor Ned Gallaway of the Rio District.

The opportunities for the public to access and participate in the electronic meeting are posted on the Albemarle County website, on the Board of Supervisors homepage, and on the Albemarle County calendar.

Did my mic go off?

Can you hear me?

That might not be a bad thing.

All right, we are through the introduction, so I will turn things over.

We're here for two public hearings tonight related to our budget, the first of which is fiscal year 2021-2022 proposed operating capital budgets.

And before that, my little glitch had me forget introductions.

We do have with us our county executive, Mr. Jeff Richardson, our county attorney, Mr. Greg Kappner,

our senior deputy clerk Mr. Travis Morris and our board clerk Ms.

Claudette Borgeson are also present and I'll be handing things over to Nelsie Burch and then our CFO.

Thank you very much.

Great.

Good evening, Chair Galloway.

Hello, everybody.

It's so good to see all of you, members of the board.

Thanks for having me this evening.

I'm going to kick us off here as Andy puts up our presentation.

We just have a few slides tonight to introduce the two public hearings that are before the board.

As you'll see, we are so close to finalizing the development of the FY22 budget.

This is our second to last interaction with the development of the FY22 budget.

And as Chair Galloway mentioned, we have two different public hearings, one for the proposed budget, FY22, and one for the proposed tax rates for calendar year 21.

I am joined today by Lori Alshouse, the Assistant CFO for Policy and Partnerships, and Andy Bowman, who is the Chief of our Budget Division,

who will help answer any questions that may come up during our session this evening.

Okay, Andy.

So the county executive recommended a budget on February 24th and since then we've had a series of public engagements around the development of the recommended and now as it's turned into the proposed budget for FY22.

Here you will see a series of work sessions that we put together after the recommended budget public hearing town halls that bring us to today.

which is April 28th for the two different public hearings that we have before you this evening.

What I wanted to make sure the board and the public knew is that the recommended budget has not changed and so the proposed budget is the recommended budget plus one addition or one monetary change which was the board's approval

of funding a transportation planner position out of the capital budget.

And so if anybody who's been watching and following the budget process, if you wanted to do the math, you would take the recommended budget plus $106,343.

which is for that planner position and that will get you to the two different figures that you'll see in a couple moments when I present a slide in just a few minutes.

And so we will be having a public hearing on that proposed budget and then also for the advertised tax rate that the board approved at their March 18th work session.

for all the tax rates that are impacting both this budget from a revenue perspective, but also the public from a tax perspective.

Next slide.

This was a nice moment for us to share with the board and the public the information that is available.

There's a couple changes that we've done this year.

We wanted to take a second just to recognize those.

Historically, and we have continued to provide information on our website,

which does include the FY22 recommended budget.

But we've added a few things this year that we thought it was important to note.

One of them is that the budget work session presentations are located in one place and they are on the budget website where we have all of this information.

I think historically if any member of the public or the board wanted to access a presentation

You would have to find the agenda and search for where that presentation landed.

And so we've pulled those together so if anybody wants to see all the presentations we've provided on the FY22 budget, you can view them in one place.

Another interesting addition this year is the board asked several questions as we move along the budget development process.

and we thought it was a good opportunity for us to provide the answers and share those publicly on our website so people can see the dialogue and really how we are engaging

and answering the various questions that come up this year.

And quite frankly, some of those questions get asked time and time again.

So it's also a great tool for our employees to be able to access.

The fourth thing on there, I actually was recently introduced to this.

I did not know we had this wonderful budget visualization tool.

which really allows somebody to go in and dive deep into where, not only where the tax dollars go but how the revenues are broken down if you want to see specifics.

It's a much more interactive tool than the stagnant, you know, the big document, the big budget document that many of you have carried around or are carrying around with you.

And then of course we've got some FAQs that are available on the website as well.

Turning to the next slide, the board and the public have seen this slide many, many times.

And we thought it was important to take a moment to reflect that this is really was our North Star in a lot of ways for developing this FY22, what we're calling the resilient budget, but it's also very much a transitionary budget.

reflective of not only living and working and figuring out the impact the pandemic has had on our community, but also how we can continue to drive performance and drive outcomes from some of these, as you see here, these nine boxes with the quality government operations on the bottom that really oversees all of that, make sure that we can complete those nine strategic priorities for the board.

The triangle on the right is something that

We're constantly keeping an eye on as we look at this transitionary budget for FY22.

We can't do what we do without having workforce that is poised and ready to come to work and trying to make sure that we stay on top of the needs that we have in the organization to stabilize our workforce.

and then also making sure that we're keeping an eye out on the economy and using the FY22 transitionary budget to help drive and make some strategic investments to help to support that.

And then lastly, our financial foundation which really guides all of our decision-making to ensure that we maintain our triple AAA.

Next slide.

This is another slide that we've used a few times, and it's something that I wanted to make sure that we shared again.

We started off with a 366 model, which I thought was a really great idea.

It predates me and my role as CFO.

but because of really the volatility of the pandemic and not really understanding where and how we were going to be impacted on the revenue side.

It was really slowing down and taking the FY21 budget which is what we're currently in in bite-sized

in kind of bite-sized chunks to make sure that we're making good solid decisions.

And then when we develop this 2022 budget it really reflects that transitionary period that we're in where we're not yet stabilized.

We're stabilizing and revenues are performing but we've got to not only make sure that we

understand the impact the pandemic has had on our revenue but also on our expenditures and how the community has adapted to the pandemic and potentially a change in the needs of this community as we move forward.

Next slide.

So here is a chart that represents what the first public hearing is about.

And that is about our proposed budget.

This right here is the all funds budget.

So this is every dollar that comes through the county's coffers, which includes the schools, special revenue funds, our capital and debt financing.

And so this is the big one, 466 million.

The next slide which you will see here is the general fund and the general fund is usually where we spend the majority of our time in a local government because this is where tax dollars, local tax dollars mostly come in as you can see there with the largest piece of that through property taxes but it's also representative of the most discretionary fund that we have in the government

It's not like grant fundings that typically have some sort of strings attached.

This is our discretionary pot is where we fund the operations of the government.

And it's also, as you'll see on the next slide, it is where we make a contribution to support our capital fund and our capital projects.

That $30.5 million is from the general fund that we take from local tax dollars and other revenues that you saw on the last slide.

And we invest in really our future and that's what the capital plan is about.

So this is the FY22 expenditures for our general fund.

And you can see it broken down there with the largest transfer

and investment that we as a community make is in our public schools.

Next slide please.

And so the previous slides really touched on the first public hearing, which is related to the FY22 operating and capital budgets.

This right here is a breakdown and I'm not gonna read all the details of this, but this was the advertised tax rates that the board moved forward with approving these as advertised back in March 18th.

and so we've done that and so tonight is the moment for the public to respond to that advertisement.

through a public hearing.

And what is of note on this slide that you don't see here, but I need to make sure that, of course, the board understands that the public, whoever's watching, recognizes that these tax rates are reflective of no change from where we are currently.

So the FY22 budget does not have an increase in the taxes that you see there.

They are remaining the same.

So with that, the next slide, I will stop and remind Chair Galloway that we will have two different public hearings.

One is for the proposed budget, which will need to be open and closed, and then one is for the tax rate.

Do a quick round here to see if there's any questions.

No questions, but Ms.

Birch or Mr. Bell, would you please stop sharing the screen?

I was trying to read all the file names before.

Very good.

So we will open our first public hearing on the Fiscal Year 22 budget.

Thank you Chair Galloway.

During public hearings the board will acknowledge speakers addressing the item listed for public hearing.

Speakers are limited to one appearance of three minutes per public hearing item.

The clerk's office will identify each speaker.

Timekeeping is conducted through a timer.

The timer will commence when you begin speaking and this begins your allotted time.

You will be notified when the three minutes are up and you are requested to bring your comments to a close as your microphone will be muted after about five more seconds.

In order to give all speakers equal treatment and courtesy, the board requests that speakers adhere to the following guidelines.

When called to address the board, please state your name and, if you live in Albemarle County, your magisterial district.

Address your comments directly to the board as a whole.

If you have written statements or other supporting material, you may email them to the clerk to be included in the record.

If you represent a group or organization, you may identify the group to be recognized.

If you exceed your allotted time, as indicated, you will be asked to end your comments and your microphone will be muted shortly thereafter.

If a speaker does not use all allocated time, the unused time may not be shared with another speaker.

A back and forth debate is not permitted.

You are reminded that all comments are live streamed, recorded, and published on the Albemarle County website.

If participating by phone, please press star nine to let us know you want to speak.

If by Zoom, please remain muted until you are called to speak.

Thank you.

Gary Grant from the Rio District and if you hear background traffic noise because I'm using a signal outside the Earliesville Exchange tonight

because a lot of the areas of Earliesville don't have CenturyLink phone service or internet for the past couple of days.

Here's my budget testimony.

Why is it that this all-Democrat Board of Supervisors is willing to saddle Albemarle taxpayers with a 17.4 percent budget increase over the current fiscal year?

Why is it that this all-Democrat Board of Supervisors

is willing to take several millions of Albemarle taxpayers approximately $4.5 million budget surplus and spend it on government employee bonuses instead of returning this excess tax takings to the taxpayers.

Why is it that this all-Democrat Board of Supervisors is willing to take excess taxes from real estate property owners and from those who rent from them

in the form of reassessment increases to feed a spend everything budget for FY22.

Why is it that you Democrats do this to us?

When will you tell us?

When and why?

All right, thank you.

Good evening.

Hello, my name is Lydia Brunk.

I use she her pronouns.

I live at 2500 Gladden Fields Lane in North Garden, part of the Samuel Miller district.

I am here today to ask that as you move forward in the budget process, you commit to providing funding for a right to counsel program in coordination with the city.

The city recently agreed to allocate $460,000 of its American Recovery Act money

towards guaranteeing a right to counsel in eviction cases for the next two years and has expressed interest in a collaboration with the county.

Not to come on too strong, but I do like living in the county and I don't want to be the backwards neighbor of Charlottesville.

It doesn't take the necessary steps to prevent an eviction crisis.

I have done work with the Seville DSA Housing Justice Committee supporting tenants who have eviction hearings.

And I have learned firsthand how Byzantine and hostile the legal system can be for anyone.

I think of myself as a fairly intelligent, well-educated person, and I've been putting a lot of time into understanding evictions and housing law, but I am not a lawyer.

And I still get tripped up pretty frequently trying to understand how to help a tenant, what they're legally supposed to do in their situation.

And landlords will do their best to take advantage of tenants' ignorance and the complexity of the system in a lot of cases.

In our canvassing, we have seen a rash of tenants who somehow never saw their eviction notices.

And we've seen landlords tell tenants they don't need to come out to court, even though the tenant is still on the docket.

And, of course, then if the tenant doesn't show up, they are evicted automatically.

We currently have an eviction moratorium in place, which is great, unless you didn't know that you had to bring documentation of your eligibility with you to court, as well as rent relief, which again is great, unless your landlord just wants you out no matter what and won't cooperate by giving you the documentation you need to apply.

Of course, you can then sue them in theory, but if you're out of money, frightened of eviction, and just struggling to keep your head above water, that's a lot easier said than done.

An eviction is a traumatic event that can follow you for a long, long time, probably the rest of your life, unless you're very, very lucky.

We've observed cases where

Families are evicted over less than $500.

If you've paid your rent in full on time for years, and then one month you have a family emergency and you come up short, then you've been trying to crawl out of that hole for a few months but haven't quite made it, your landlord's been jerking you around about a payment plan, and then they try to evict you and you're suddenly thrust into a legal universe of obscure opaque legalese and courtroom etiquette.

Your landlord probably has a lawyer or maybe a team of lawyers and you're there by yourself just trying to stay in your home.

You deserve to be on an even playing field.

You deserve a fair chance.

You shouldn't be out on the street just because you didn't know the right thing to say to the judge.

We are looking at a crisis on our hands when the protections tenants do currently have expire.

A right to counsel is crucial for our community.

Good evening.

Hello.

Can you hear me?

Yes, sir.

All right.

Thank you, sir.

My name is Javier Rodales.

I'm a longtime resident of the Samuel Miller district.

I wanted to demand that the Board of Supervisors take an initiative to allocate funding for a right to counsel in eviction cases for county residents.

Right to counsel for those facing the eviction system is imperative to justice in our community at large.

Albemarle County normally has an eviction rate that is similar to the city, and when the eviction moratorium ends, both are at risk of an eviction crisis.

An eviction crisis can quickly become a homeless crisis.

It's in everybody's interest that this is prevented.

I work primarily with immigrant families, mostly of Latinx descent.

They have faced the brunt of the impact of the

pandemic due to forces outside of themselves, illness or economic crises that have affected the community I support.

A right to counsel will allow tenants to avail themselves to the rights they have.

Since last fall, Charlottesville DSA has been observing the eviction hearings that they have been provided access to observing.

In both courthouses, no tenant who has had an attorney was evicted.

With the right to counsel, we not only ensure tenants understand their rights, we can also create an incentive for landlords to negotiate.

I urge the Board of Supervisors to support a budget that includes right to counsel for those in our community facing eviction.

It is imperative to the safety and public health of our community that all members of our community can navigate the legal system of our county.

Thank you.

All right, good evening.

Good evening.

So basically, my name is Sid Patel.

It's Rio, the district, and the address is 1760 Rio Hill Center.

I'd like to speak regarding the tobacco cigarette tax increase.

Okay.

The reason I like to oppose about the cigarette tax

Last year, governor already increased the cigarette tax to the whole state already.

And increasing in just the Albemarle, in just cigarette tax, that local citizens, the smokers, they have a chance to go nearby city to shop their cigarettes.

So particular in a county,

to increase like $0.40 or $4 a carton.

Looks like it's not much, but it's big things, especially the COVID hit for a lot of peoples.

So I have a request.

If it is state-wise happening, then it's OK.

Maybe you guys are looking to get more revenue.

But on the other side, a lot of people

to make

the local citizen, especially the smokers, they have to go out of the city to swap their cigarette.

So instead of getting revenue, in the long run, there is a chance maybe losing the revenue.

So I'd like the board member to look very carefully, especially this time of year, not to increase the cigarette tax.

Thank you, sir.

My understanding is that was our last speaker this evening.

Do we have any others signed up confirming?

All right.

And we will move to the next number three, our calendar year 2021 tax rates.

Yeah, thank you.

Double check, right?

So we'll go ahead.

Do we have signups for this one this evening?

Yes, we have one.

All right, and I think we did the rules earlier.

Thank you, Chair Galloway.

During public hearings, the board will acknowledge speakers addressing the item listed for public hearing and speakers are limited to one appearance of three minutes.

The clerk's office will identify each speaker.

When called to address the board, please state your name and if you live in Albemarle County, your magisterial district, address your comments directly to the board as a whole.

If you have written statements or other supporting material, you may email them to the clerk.

If you represent a group or organization you may identify the group to be recognized.

If you exceed your allotted time you will be asked in your comments and the microphone will be muted after about five more seconds.

If the speaker does not use all allocated time the unused time may not be shared with another speaker.

Back and forth debate is not permitted.

And you are reminded that all comments are live streamed, recorded, and published on the Albemarle County website.

If participating by phone, please press star nine to let us know you want to speak.

If by Zoom, please remain muted until you are called to speak.

Thank you.

All right, who's our speaker this evening?

Our speaker is Gary Grant.

I'm unmuted.

Yes, sir.

Gary Grant again from the Rio district.

This is tax rate testimony.

Why is it that this all-Democrat Board of Supervisors is willing to inflict a tax increase on Albemarle taxpayers for FY22 instead of holding Albemarle taxpayers harmless in the new fiscal year by supporting an effective, also known as lowered, tax rate

of 82.6 cents per $100 valuation instead of the 85.4 cents per $100 valuation rate.

Why is it that this all-Democrat Board of Supervisors is willing to inflict a tax increase this calendar year on Albemarle taxpayers of 2.8 cents per $100 valuation instead of supporting no tax increase on Albemarle taxpayers?

Why is it that this all-Democrat Board of Supervisors is willing to inflict a tax rate increase on some of the most financially vulnerable residents of Albemarle County this calendar year?

Those owning or renting property in Albemarle's urban residential areas, where reassessments rose an average of 3.1 percent, rose the highest in the Jack Jouett district at an average of 3.3 percent,

rose an average of 2.4% in the Samuel Miller district and rose an average of 2.5% in the White Hall district.

Why is it that Supervisor candidates Galloway and McKeel are in support of tax increases on property owners and renters in the Rio and Jack Jouett districts where they want to be reelected?

Why is it that you Democrats do this to us?

When will you tell us?

When and why, Albemarle Democrats?

All right, good evening.

Good evening, can everybody hear me?

Yes sir.

All right, thank you, good evening to the board.

Again, thank you for the opportunity.

My name is Jay James, I'm a

A city resident in our community and I'm a board member and a volunteer for an organization that has applied for funding for FY22 that is in local nonprofit.

It's called the Bridge Ministry and it serves men who are dealing with life controlling issues who are indigent criminal defendants who are court ordered by the Albemarle Circuit Court to enter the program and successfully complete it or otherwise face returning to incarceration.

with an 86% success rate.

I know all of you are familiar with the organization and you're familiar with my advocacy for it and what I say tonight it might not change anything in terms of the final decision because I know that there's a formulating process that we go through but I feel compelled to just share a few things with you this evening.

You know

The Bridge Ministry has been in this community for 25 years to serving this type of populace, people who have been disproportionately impacted, who've been dealing with incarceration and homelessness and a lack of vocational skills and helping them to become productive citizens in our community.

But also the question has been raised because ministry is in our name and I know Supervisor Price raised that question.

I know staff has raised it.

The Bridge Ministry was deemed reliable by the state

and it was inspected by state personnel at the Department of Corrections.

Per diems were approved and at one point probation and parole at District 9 was using the bridge ministry on a regular basis and paying per diems from state funding to an organization and we all know that for them to do that there couldn't be any church and state separations concerns.

The bridge ministry is not a church

It's not owned by a church or partially by a church.

It's owned by an individual by the name of William Washington as the sole owner and proprietor who founded the organization.

And it's a rehab facility.

And that's why Department of Corrections personnel have put faith in using it over the years.

We have a number of concerns, an organization that is new to our community that's been serving in this area for five to six years to be funded.

And then for an organization that has served this populace for 25 years to not be funded

is a great concern.

And when it comes to the faith element, as I said before, it's not a church, but it's a rehab facility.

And the faith aspect is we help people with impossible situations, overcome them and benefit from our rehabilitation program.

The final thing is this, when I look at organizations who weren't funded out of the 32 and the ABRT process, it's all human services.

And I used to be in fundraising for the Albemarle Charlottesville SPCA in terms of their events.

and I noticed in the FY22 budget that they were recommended for $652,000 in an organization like ours and five others that was not recommended for funding.

And it just, it concerns me because these human services are critical in a $444 million budget that we couldn't find other funding for these human services, yet for dogs and cats, who I love greatly and do support, we have $652,000 in the budget.

These are my concerns.

I want to thank you all for your service and for your time.

And as I said before, I'm hopeful that the community, even if it doesn't make a difference with the six of you, that the community will pay attention to the things I'm saying.

Thank you.

All right.

We will close the public hearing and bring the matter to the board.

And for both public hearings,

We appreciate those who signed up and who gave comment tonight, and supervisors may wish to make any reaction or comments to what they've heard this evening or other items.

I'll go through our order.

Not a remark, a question, and certainly we always appreciate, I always appreciate everybody that comes forward to give us their concerns and suggestions, etc.

I'd like it if maybe we can ask our county attorney to at some point, maybe in written form, just comment on this situation with the request for legal representation in evictions, or maybe that will be the county executive, I'm not quite sure who would be appropriate to answer that.

But I would like to know a little bit more, is the city doing this?

Has there been any financial requests made there, but what exactly does this entail?

Alright, delayed getting muted.

I want to check and see how and what the city did.

Thank you, and that was County Attorney Campner who just added those comments, and actually that's the exact same area that I was going to ask.

I know there has been discussion on it, I just can't recall exactly where it is, so I too am interested in the situation with regard to some sort of legal support for community members facing eviction.

Thank you, Supervisor Palmer.

Thank you, Chair Galloway, for the opportunity to comment.

Yes, thank you.

I agree with Liz and Donna.

I spoke with Jim Hengeley about this when we first received an email, and so it might be helpful, Greg, with your work as well as something from Jim around this particular issue.

I believe, if I remember correctly,

The help for the evictions contains a sunset clause that once the pandemic is over, I don't know, anyway, I would be interested in more information about it as well.

So thank you.

And I don't have any other questions.

I just appreciate everybody that came to speak to us today.

Thank you.

My question is also on the Council for Evictions and I was looking through the emails I had received and read and there was not a dollar amount listed.

I have a question and I have a remark.

Mr. Bowman, are you there and available?

Yes, I am.

I know that this 17% year over year increase question has come up now in an earlier community meeting again tonight and it was one that was asked and answered during one of my town halls.

Sure, I can speak to that.

And really, I think I would start with when we look at the total county budget, all funds as Mr. Burch described, that refers to our general fund and the school funds, which are primary day-to-day operations.

It also includes a grant and other special revenue funding, but it does include a pretty significant piece that can vary year to year for our capital and debt funding.

and to give some perspective on how that impacts that 17 percent increase.

When we look at our revenues specifically related to our use of fund balance and borrowed proceeds which are primarily the funding sources of the capital program which for those who are listening and not aware that refers to kind of those larger kind of construction and facility maintenance projects that are more generational projects than year to year or multi-year in nature.

of the total about 69 million dollar increase in proposed budget.

Approximately, I'm going to use some round numbers here, about 42, 43 million or so of that is between those two categories.

I should note that of our fund balance we also have as part of our approach at the we call our 366 management plan as part when the pandemic began we really took an approach to really slam the brakes on spending and be very conservative in our approach at the end of fiscal year 20.

Now the result of that is that created a fund balance that was then available to strategically invest as the economy began to stabilize and we began to see that we were worse out of the economic situation in the pandemic in total.

I'm not to say that individuals or businesses individually have not been impacted, but we look at the total impact on county revenues.

Our economic picture has continued to improve from where we thought it would be a year ago.

So certainly a portion of that one-time funding for both wealth and government in schools is being reinvested, you know, strategically through that pyramid that Ms.

Burch shared at the beginning of her presentation to ensure our financial foundation, to support our economic stability and community support, and also the workforce stabilization.

I would note that when we look at our revenues, such as property taxes and other local taxes, there is an impact where, as I said before, when we prepared the fiscal year 21 budget, we were really about less than a month into the current pandemic and did not have a lot of information on what the impacts would be.

And we took some revenue projections and kind of the road we took, it was

More pessimistic than things have actually turned out to be.

Revenues are certainly impacted when we look at things like meals tax and transit occupancy tax.

They are below where we were in the prior year.

The impact has not been as significant as we thought it would be about 12 months ago.

So part of the revenue increase we're seeing is not just the growth that is projected to occur next year, but the growth that is happening from a lowered starting point at the start of fiscal year 21.

and I think the other point I would note would be our state revenue.

The school division is receiving about 5.2 million in additional state revenue based on the updated state budget and so that in combination with the change in the capital budget, capital program I should say, looking at both our cash funded and our debt funded and also just looking at kind of our lower starting point with the economy and the pandemic.

Those would be the primary reasons that make up that 17 percent.

And I would say it's one of the reasons that Mr. Burch mentioned at the start is a lot of our focus is from the general fund because year to year that is a little more typical of what is apples to apples because as you can imagine, you know, I think this would be a good example with the next phase of the course project coming in this year is about 25 million or so.

Obviously, that was not part of last year's budget.

It's part of this year's budget.

It will not be part of that next year.

And that's not anything unique to Albemarle County.

That's just kind of the nature of capital projects.

I appreciate the response.

Does anyone have a follow-up for Mr. Bauman?

Chair Galloway, if I could just add one more data point.

If you look at the general fund year over year, and Andy can correct me if my number is wrong, but it was only a 4.8% growth.

And so that's really a more reflective number for the impact on the really the local economy, the local taxpayers.

That's the growth.

And much of that growth is also part of that conservativeness that we had on the revenue side.

So it isn't a total impact to a resident or a taxpayer.

It's more reflective of our conservative projections.

So if I understand it right, Ms.

Burch or Mr. Bowman, 17% is mathematically accurate but very misleading when you try to apply that to the totality of the situation and it is substantially lower effective increase over last year's budget.

Yes, I would say that.

Typically, I think in some of our benchmarking with other localities and trying to understand trends, the current budget is always an interesting point of information because it does tell the story.

So really, the particulars become extremely important, the pieces of the calculation, not just the one total figure at the end.

Yeah, and one more thing I'll add, Vice Chair Price, is that whenever the years that we issue any sort of bond financing, this is one of them, we're getting ready to issue some debt in a couple months, that is also going to inflate that number.

Because the use, so we issue let's say $20-30 million.

we have to account for those proceeds and so if we issued that this year but we don't issue it next year which actually is going to be our plan we're going to go every other year that's also going to show some of the swing and some of what Andy was talking about with respect to the capital budget and and it's and it's um it's it's not a steady number and much of that's driven by that use of uh but by the bond proceeds that amount that we get in

Thank you, Ms.

Burch.

That really will be important next year.

If I may add one more thing just because I don't want to sound dismissive of other funds or the aspects of the budget because they are important, but I should say that the general fund does include the local contribution to the school division and the local contribution to the capital debt program.

The school division is growing by 5.2% and the capital portion is that I believe $37 million that Ms.

Burch referenced earlier in the presentation.

Well, thank you both.

I mean, it's important that we understand and clarify these things as the questions are asked.

I really like the budget process because this is my remark, and it will be, I guess, the answer to one of the questions that came up in public comment tonight.

So the when, I guess, is now.

The why is the budget book.

When we talk about the tax rate that we set, whether we raise it, keep it the same, whether we lower it, the revenue that we brought in, the taxes that we collect, the taxes we turn around and then spend, the why is all right there in the budget

It's in the salaries that we pay.

It's in the positions that we choose to fill.

It's in the capital and projects that we determine that we're going to pursue.

It's in the strategic plan.

That's how we prioritize what we're going to spend those dollars on.

So the why is all right there.

And the beauty of that is it's in the document.

It accounts for everything.

And we have had discussions and we've taken votes and we've said what our priorities are.

We've had public meetings out with our community.

I'm asked all the time why our tax rate.

I'm asked by people that don't even live in the county about our tax rate.

And that's the question.

That's how I answer that question.

It's in our budget book.

How we program spending of those dollars is the answer to why that tax rate.

And then it's up to the public to decide if, in this case, this supervisor are my priorities in line with theirs.

are my decisions in line with theirs.

And like the speaker mentioned, it's an election year and they'll determine if that's the case or not.

But that's the answer, in my opinion, for that.

And I think the constituent deserved a response on that one.

Very good.

Those were my remarks.

Thank you.

I just wanted to add a thought about the bonuses because I have also received calls from constituents who said, well, I didn't get a bonus and my retirement didn't go up.

And I have explained that to me, since I think the majority or at least half of the years on which I've been on the board, there have been no raises for many, many different reasons because of efforts to survive the recession and for the board to be as conservative as possible.

The other that's really important is the complete disruption of staff when of operations and productivity and service to the community when we lose lots of our experienced staff to other communities.

I have been told by representatives from other counties that they would love to hire away our staff because they know that there's been lots of training going on and this is a

service culture to our community that they would love to be able to benefit from.

So I think this bonus is an important stopgap to keep our workforce together as much as we can, and we all benefit from their continued service.

It's okay.

I'm sorry.

I have a request and I don't have to have the information tonight but one of the comments was that we constantly have a spend everything budget and in reality we really put aside a good deal of money to make sure that we are careful and we're looking to save money in case there are bad events like a pandemic

Is there a way that staff could provide us very simply, because I really don't want you guys to have to, but very simply just some simple bullets about where we have saved money and not just spent money?

I think that could be very helpful for us as well because we know we've done it over the

We have processes that automatically put money aside for emergencies.

And so just a short summary of some of that would be very helpful.

Yeah, what I'd like to share is we will be providing that actually quite naturally because we're going to issue and going to the bond market.

in the next two months.

So we're going to have some two-on-twos with the board in anticipation of a May 19th board discussion and decision around a bond resolution.

That entire process working with the rating agencies, we have to convince them that we're worthy of a AAA, and we have three of them.

And so one of those is going to absolutely be where

Where is your savings?

Where's your rainy day?

How have you been able to weather the pandemic?

What are you doing to help, you know, kind of stabilize your revenues as you don't know how your revenues are going to perform?

That would be lovely.

I would appreciate that just in a simple way that I as a supervisor could share that with my constituents.

The AAA bond is a lot more complicated.

Supervisor Price, I see your hand raised.

Thank you, Chair Galloway, and Ms.

Burch, thank you for that last comment.

I think one of the important things for our constituents to appreciate is there are three major bond rating agencies.

The highest rating you can get is a AAA, so when you speak of a triple AAA, what you're really talking about is the county has achieved from all three of those credit reporting agencies.

highest bond rating that a government organization can keep, can attain.

By keeping that, that means the costs of financing are substantially lower for us.

It's just like having a good credit score as a consumer.

The higher your credit score, the lower the interest you pay and the more available the funds will be when you need it.

And as Supervisor McKeel was just talking about, there are two things in terms of the stewardship

The county staff does exceptionally well under your leadership as our chief financial officer and throughout the county and that is we're careful how we spend our money.

but we also are very careful about what's going on and what may appear to be a surplus may actually have just been good stewardship over the time of the year and as Supervisor McKeel and other supervisors have mentioned either tonight or on other occasions we do maintain a strategic reserve which everyone it's the county's rainy day fund so it's very important I think for our constituents our community members to understand

Thank you.

And just one more quick comment to add to what Donna just said, Nelsie.

I've been involved in Albemarle County government and school board for a long time.

I can't even remember.

We've had the AAA bond rating a long time.

I mean, we have been doing this and taking good care of our taxpayers' dollars as best we can.

And I would be interested in how many years we have had that AAA bond rating, because I know it's been a long time in the big picture.

All right.

The next item on our agenda tonight from the board.

Committee reports and matters not listed on the agenda.

Just one.

This Friday and Saturday is Household Hazardous Waste Days, Amnesty.

You can go out to IVMUC and get rid of all those yard chemicals and pesticides that have been hiding in the back of your garage or basement for years.

It's just a great free way to do that.

You can check the site, the

Supervisor Price?

Nothing tonight.

Thank you, Chair Galloway.

Just to comment because many of us attended the kickoff today for the Let's Talk Albemarle, our van that's going to be going around the county to keep everyone connected.

And I really just want to thank staff because that it was an ingenious idea.

And I just appreciate it a lot, and I hope that we'll get a few updates about how that vehicle is being used.

Yes, I hope we will actually be able to have parades this year, in which case I hope the van will come because that would be a great way for people to see it.

Mike Hall, I had a thought.

Oh, blast.

I'm sorry, I've lost it.

Go ahead.

Yes, I just had two things I wanted to mention.

It's obvious that our county has been very good stewards of our finances, our spending, and our savings during this pandemic.

I think our staff has done an extraordinary job

But most importantly, I think we have to recognize that we have still given service to our community.

That was top on our list.

We've given service to our community in spite of the pandemic and with all the financial concerns and being conservative in how we spend our monies.

That was number one.

Number two, this Saturday at Darden Tow starting at 10 o'clock we are planting milkweed seeds around Darden Tow Park.

There will be no mowing.

We're going to have a natural habitat that won't be mowed.

It will be mowed once a year, but otherwise our milkweed plants will thrive.

We're calling the project Save the Monarch because it's all about the monarch butterfly.

And for those of you that don't know this, there is a natural migration path, I've been told, that goes through Darden Town Park.

So come out and join us Saturday at 10 o'clock.

We'll be there for a couple hours.

Good.

And just to follow up on Supervisor McKeel and the Let's Talk Albemarle, the book was Our

or the Monacan Indians, Our Story.

This was the books that were being delivered to the little libraries at seven different parks.

And this book was written by Karen Wood and Diane Shields.

And we were lucky to have Diane Shields there today to participate in the ribbon cutting and the delivery, the first delivery of the books to the library.

So that was great.

I will, and I don't know if Supervisor Mallek will piggyback on here, but I mean, you know,

I think at this point having a public soapbox, if you would, that there are plenty of residents who have complained about, and rightly so, of CenturyLink's lack of service, which is probably more than just in the Earliesville section, but we certainly hear about it quite a bit there, both phone and internet going down.

And Supervisor Mallek, I know, works and has brought this up before.

know that she stomps her feet at the state level as much as she can or every chance she gets.

But the fact is that we're in a position to be able to make comments on it because if people, especially these past 13 months, if people didn't have access to either their phone or their internet, they couldn't participate with us.

And that's part of the reason why these virtual meetings have been so successful is people have been able to participate from their home and

If bringing it up can just help shed some light on it, I'm willing to do that as often as I can because this company needs to know that they need to abide by the fees they're receiving, the rates they charge, and be delivering the proper service to their customers.

So those are my thoughts or comments on that.

Yes, I think the constant talking about it is a good thing and reaching out to the telephone part of the Century Link operation is what is regulated in a very small way by the SEC in Virginia.

But their broadband, that kind of connectivity internet is not.

And so it is a hand were dealt by the General Assembly and

So I'm very grateful all the work that Donna and Liz plus Mike Culp and Trevor are doing to be able to help us find other ways to get connected as quickly as we can throughout the county will really be helpful.

I agree that it's not right to be taking people's money and not providing the service that they pay for for months and months for delayed delivery and the count I worry that the

The county should not be getting into that trap either.

So I'm really grateful that we are going off in more complete directions.

And so I look forward to updates from how we're going to be reacting to the new federal law and the new state money, but the federal law and the federal money going forward on this.

I know that people in the Scottsville area have been down as well.

or weeks and days at a time.

Yeah, as a CenturyLink customer, just adding my voice to that, you notice that I attend all of my meetings virtually from the county office building because of the unreliability of the service out in the county.

So, but I also, I appreciate your comments, Mike Cole.

Liz, the broadband authority and the county are working really hard at doing what we can to improve it and we know it's a problem.

All right and the next item from the county executive report on matters not listed on the agenda.

Mr. Richardson any items here this evening?

No sir I don't have any items to report tonight.

Thank you.

Thank you sir.

All right board thank you all and we appreciate the citizens who came out to speak.

We appreciate all the speakers that came out to speak in regard to the budget and the tax rate and with that if no objection we will adjourn to May 5th

2021, 1 p.m.

That will be an electronic meeting pursuant to ordinance number 20-8-16, an ordinance to ensure the continuity of government during the COVID-19 disaster.

Information on how to participate in the meeting will be posted on the Albemarle County website.

All right, thank you everyone.

Have a good evening.