County approves $118.6 million budget amidst pandemic revenue questions

It’s almost like being there, kind of … Royal Examiner Photos/Roger Bianchini

The new, populist “we-want-a-change-from-business-as-usual” Warren County Board of Supervisors majority wrestled with approval of their first County Budget Tuesday night, April 21. Over the last hour of a nearly three-hour meeting behind locked Government Center doors but viewable to the public online, the board tackled its Fiscal Year-2021 budget under the economic cloud cast by the COVID-19 (Coronavirus Disease-2019) pandemic and consequent business, school and governmental closings.

After that hour of discussion of budget variables presented by staff and what had been heard earlier in public comments read, occasionally dramatically, into the record by Board Clerk Emily Ciarrocchi, a slight rift developed among the board’s new majority.

Two of the three newly elected supervisors, Shenandoah District’s Walter Mabe and North River District’s Delores Oates, joined the two incumbents not up for re-election last November, Archie Fox, and Tony Carter, in approving the $118,611,309 Fiscal Year-2021 budget. The approved budget keeps existing County tax rates flat and authorizes all proposed Sanitary District fee increases.

But after expressing continued concerns about unknown pandemic-driven economic variables and their impact on citizens, South River’s Cheryl Cullers cast a lone dissenting vote against the budget proposal.

Cullers said she had some “heartburn” about authorizing the proposed Shenandoah Farms Sanitary District lot fee increases during the COVID-19 Coronavirus pandemic crisis. The Shenandoah Farms lot proposal was to raise both the existing unimproved lot fee of $265 and an improved lot fee of $305, to $350 annually, for an $85 increase for unimproved lots and $45 for improved lots.

The Cedarville Sanitary District fee increase proposal was from $100 per all lots to $250, or a $150 increase. But apparently no one in Cedarville had “heartburn” about paying extra to fund new capital improvements there – at least I don’t recall hearing them being read into the record Tuesday.

However, the board did hear 20 emailed public comments read into the record by the clerk Tuesday evening, many addressing the Farms Sanitary District fee proposal designed to support district road improvements.

Contacted Wednesday to verify the number of public comments on the issue, Ciarrocchi said that while some people filed multiple emailed comments which were read, counting by household responses, Wednesday’s comment breakdown was five for the proposed lot fee increases, four against. As to the overall Farms response on three option sites that had been available, of 240 total responses, 169 (58%) were for the increase, with 71 (42%) against.

However, Cullers had other questions on approval of the total budget package, including the public schools’ $26.95-million portion – “I don’t want them to think I don’t appreciate what they do,” Cullers stated during her comments – until more was known about revenue impacts and citizens’ ability to pay their bills and county taxes to support the coming fiscal year budget.

What budget, there’s nobody there since last month, some might think from the occasionally empty School Administration parking lot. – But yes, there have been people there, and education continues, if virtually, as does the free lunch program distribution, not virtually – GO, Public Schools; and GO Warren and Skyline High Classes of 2020!!

But much as Town officials discussed the previous evening, County Administrator Doug Stanley suggested budget approval with a number of areas funded on a contingency basis reviewable by the board on an interim, likely monthly basis as FY-2021 progresses and pandemic revenue impacts become clearer.

And the board majority agreed to take that tack in moving forward into the choppy financial waters of the COVID-19 Emergency Management responses at federal, state, and local levels. County Administrator Stanley acknowledged the help of former County Finance Directors Carolyn Stimmel and Andre Fletcher in preparation of the FY-2021 Budget Proposal.

After Stanley read the rather lengthy proposed motion as he continued to explain suggested contingency measures to deal with the fluid revenue landscape evolving into the coming fiscal year, Carter chimed in by remote hook up to make the motion as Stanley had presented it, with the change of a request that all departments work to reduce their budget proposals by one percent to provide over $380,000 of contingency funding.

For our report on the approval of the County’s FY-2021, $118.6-million budget, here is the meeting record of that approval:

“On a motion by Mr. Carter, seconded by Mr. Fox, and by the following vote, the Board of Supervisors adopted the proposed FY 2020-2021 budget in the amount of $118,611,309, which includes the budgets for County departments and the School Operating Fund, the 2020 tax rates as advertised, the School Cafeteria Fund in the amount of $3,070,728, and the Sanitary District tax rates and budgets as advertised.

“The Board further froze the implementation of the proposed 1.5% cost of living adjustment (COLA) salary increase and Phase II of the Compensation Plan for County employees until the full impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the County’s revenues can be ascertained. The Board finally moved that each County Department be asked to cut 1% from Departmental budgets, the aggregate of which is $382,940, funds which will be placed in budget line 91000-5899 (Reserve for Contingencies):

“Vote: Carter, Aye; Oates, Aye; Mabe, Aye; Cullers, No; Fox, Aye.”

Waiting for the meetings to start is a little different – it’s not quite like ‘Waiting for Godot’, though it might be considered a little existential.

Present physically for Tuesday’s meeting in the Warren County Government Center Caucus Room, and masked per COVID-19 emergency management guidelines, were Board Chairman Mabe, Vice-Chair Cullers, and Fork District Supervisor Fox, along with County Administrator Stanley, Board Clerk Ciarrocchi, and Deputy County Administrator Bob Childress for portions of the meeting, as well as cameraman Dwayne Coates. Present by occasionally feeding-back or distorted remote hookups were Happy Creek Supervisor Tony Carter, along with North River Supervisor Delores Oates and County Attorney Jason Ham.

See the budget discussion and other business conducted Tuesday night in this Royal Examiner recording of the April 21^st broadcast of the Warren County Board of Supervisors meeting. Included in that “other” business were:

A – approval of a Resolution setting the percentage rate for Personal Property Tax Relief on qualifying vehicles, 36% $1,001 to $20,000 assessed value, 100% valued at $1,000 or under;

B – approval of a Conditional Use Permit for short-term rental by Joseph W. Coleman for a single-family dwelling at 37 Wellspring Road in Browntown.

And a number of items pulled from the Consent Agenda including authorizations to advertise for Public Hearings on four matters:

1 – an ordinance to delay penalties and interest assessments “on Certain Local Taxes during the COVID-19 pandemic”;

2 – an ordinance “Assuring Continuity in the Government of Warren County, Virginia”;

3 – a Capital Improvement Plan (CIP) for Shenandoah Farms Sanitary District; and,

4 – an ordinance to “Vacate the existing 50-foot-wide Platted Right of Way (Pawnee Place)” in the Thunderbird Ranch subdivision.

Not pulled from the Consent Agenda and approved without discussion was a request from County Building Code Official David Beahm to adopt a Resolution “proclaiming May 2020 as Building Safety Month”.