Economic heartburn for localities

OUR OPINION
Published: March 6, 2008

Prince William County, Manassas, Haymarket… you name the jurisdiction and we will show you a place with money troubles.

Housing assessments in Manassas were released this week. After years of double digit assessed value increases, the long climb of economic success went into freefall last year. And that fall continued this year. The value of single-family homes in the city fell an average of 18.5 percent.

To compensate for the fall in assessed values, City Manager Lawrence Hughes proposed nearly a 13-cent real estate tax increase; the new rate he is proposing is 98.3 cents per $100 of assessed value.

Neighboring Prince William County is having tough tax decisions to make as well. The Prince William Board of County Supervisors could not agree on a tax rate to advertise Tuesday, so they had to push off the decision until March 18.

At various times during the supervisors meeting different tax rates were discussed. There was $1.032 per $100 of assessed value, 96.8 cents, 99 cents, 99.1 cents and $1.01. All of these rates are a jump from the current base rate of 78.7 cents per $100 of assessed value. Once a rate is advertised, the supervisors can reduce but not raise the rate in final budget deliberations.

And Haymarket is so tight for cash that its budget could be coming up short.

Falling real estate assessments are also contributing to this town’s issues, and town officials are considering raising its real estate tax rate as well. But even in doing that, Town Manager Gene Swearingen is not sure it will be enough. The town might have to find other things to cut in order to come up with the money it needs.

Needless to say, these three localities aren’t the only ones experiencing money woes, but they are prime examples.

All jurisdictions have low periods and high periods. For a number of years, business was booming in all of these areas and the worry was how to spend all of the money coming in. Now, the economy is going slack and we are all coming up short.

It is times like these that really demonstrate our elected officials’ ability to lead. It is easy to find ways to spend taxpayer money, but it is harder to find ways to conserve it. As the budget season goes forward for all these jurisdictions we will see how well our leaders respond to the pressure.

Just remember that times are tough for all of us and hard decisions will be made. We must live with them so that we can make it through the bad times and, one day, back to the good.