Fairfax County supervisors on Monday scheduled a day of unpaid leave for thousands of employees early next year, brushing aside written protests from groups that said the hardship imposed on workers will far outweigh the savings.
The Jan. 2 furloughs will save as much as $2 million, part of the Board of Supervisors’ strategy to close an estimated $58 million budget shortfall this fiscal year. Supervisors also decided to ask the school system to explore similar budget cuts and to trim their own office budgets by 7 percent.
The furloughs, while solving only a small fraction of the shortfall, have drawn the most scrutiny of any the county’s belt-tightening measures in recent months. Officials have said the unpaid leave would apply to roughly 9,000 workers, excluding critical positions such as police officers and emergency personnel.
The Fairfax County Employees Advisory Council argued the money saved is “not commensurate with the hardship it creates for county employees that lose 10 percent of one paycheck,” Chairwoman Anita Baker wrote in a memo to supervisors last week.
“Further use of this approach is an unacceptable means to achieve a balanced budget,” she wrote.
Two other groups, the Fairfax County Government Employees Union and Service Employees International Union, asked the decision to be delayed in a joint memo to county officials.
“A furlough would cause a severe hardship for many county employees struggling under the weight of this economic crisis,” the memo said.
“We believe the county should consider all of the options available and implement furloughs only after all other options have been exercised.”
Montgomery County Executive Ike Leggett has proposed two furlough days in an effort to shore up the county’s budget, and Prince George’s County Council has approved a 10-day furlough for employees.
Some Fairfax supervisors also unsuccessfully pushed for a delay of Monday’s decision. Republicans Pat Herrity and Mike Frey cast two lone votes to postpone any vote until Nov. 14, when the board could more extensively discuss immediate service cuts.
Said Supervisors Chairman Gerry Connolly: “I think it’s probably delaying the inevitable, and I think it sends a bad signal to the public we serve.”
In a separate e-mail sent to the board Monday, Baker also questioned whether the furloughs would require a public hearing on changing the county’s personnel policies, which county officials disputed.
Fairfax County faces a larger shortfall next fiscal year of $500 million.
