Fairfax homeowners would see their property taxes increase by an average of $157 next year based on County Executive Anthony Griffin’s fiscal 2012 budget proposal to be released Tuesday morning. Griffin’s proposed tax rate is expected to stay the same at $1.09 per $100 of assessed value, said Board of Supervisors Chairman Sharon Bulova, D-At Large. The average homeowner’s tax burden would increase despite the steady rate because of the recovering housing market and its accompanying increase in property values.
The rate would maintain a “status quo” budget that does not include any raises for county employees, including teachers and police.
The proposed tax rate in Arlington County went up by a penny this year to 96.8 cents. Loudoun County proposed raising its rate to $1.32, while Prince William decreased its rate to $1.21.
Bulova said that the supervisors would have the option to lower the rate at their meeting on Tuesday but that they would not increase it.
Republican Supervisors Pat Herrity, R-Springfield, and John Cook, R-Braddock, bridled Monday at the possibility of a rate increase.
“Very simply, we need to drop the rate by 3 cents in order to keep homeowners’ taxes the same,” Herrity said. “We doubled people’s taxes between 2000 and 2007, and it’s past time that we give them some relief.”
Any move to bring down the proposed or advertised rate likely would be met with the argument that the county needs financial flexibility in coming months in order to manage what certainly will be fierce calls from employees and agencies for at least modest pay increases.
Griffin’s plan sets up a tense debate between the school system — the county’s biggest spender at $2.2 billion — and the supervisors who hold the county’s purse strings.
In January, Fairfax schools Superintendent Jack Dale put forth a budget that relied upon a $50 million increase from the county, largely to pay for raises for the first time since 2009 and for a projected enrollment increase of about 2,000 students.
“It’d be tough to cut our budget any more,” school board member Jane Strauss said. “And we’d very much like to be able to pay our people who’ve had a pay freeze and the 3,200 employees who’ve had a pay cut” because of shorter contract lengths.
