CHARLOTTESVILLE, VA (CVILLE RIGHT NOW) – The Albemarle County Board of Supervisors approved a revised $727.7 million overall budget for fiscal 2027 that holds the line on tax rates, revised up from a originally presented $724 million plan, at its Wednesday meeting.

“Technical adjustments scattered throughout are the difference between tonight and what was presented,” Albemarle County Communications Director Abbey Stumpf told Cville Right Now.

Most budget items look similar to the original presentation.

At the direction of supervisors last week, staff was able to add an additional $2 million to the Affordable Housing Investment Fund without a 15-cent personal property tax hike that supervisors advertised and floating for two weeks.

Staff used an array of adjustments to get there that included moving $1.15 million from the “planned General Fund transfer to the Economic Development Fund” instead.

The adjustment also used $313,000 from the “ongoing Reserve for Contingencies,” leaving $350,000 in that fund.

Another adjustment is to “use the remaining balances from the one-time Reserve for Contingencies, $510k and the CIP Advancing Strategic Priorities Reserve, $394,000” toward the priority.

Rio Supervisor Sally Duncan said she’s not really sure what that all means.

“I don’t even understand actually, totally what final number we’re at with AHIF, because you guys do the math in the air and say you’ve gotten us to some point, and I trust you,” she said. “It’s not clear where this money’s coming from, so going forward I would love to see a point of getting to 10 million ongoing funding without having to do all this stuff.”

Staff also used some of the money to add $117,000 to the Albemarle County Emergency Relief Program (ACERP), and add smaller amounts toward fully funding OAR-Therapeutic Docket and Foothills Child Advocacy; and be able to restore funding to the 2026 level for the Charlottesville Band and Charlottesville Ballet.

They also appropriated $136,000 to the Dogwood Vietnam Memorial Foundation that had not been funded in the budget.

The additional $2 million for AHIF brings the total appropriation for fiscal ’27 to $7.033 million.

While that’s closer to the $10 million most supervisors would like to see each year, Duncan and Scottsville Supervisor Mike Pruitt are concerned about where the additional money comes from.

Of the $2 million additional to AHIF, $1,917,863 came from one-time funding, and $82,137 came from ongoing funding.

“I understand how they got there, but I also, in my mind, am hearing Chair (Ned) Gallaway, I’ve heard you say explicitly like several times and it’s stuck with me and really got into my head, you threw out arbitrary numbers, but you said I would much rather have $10 in recurring funds than 100 in one-time funds for the housing trust fund because it’s important we develop that ongoing stream,” Pruitt said. “So, I find myself gritting my teeth in frustration after we had planned to make a two million disbursement to AHIF, which I applaud this board for doing, but because so much of our final round of funding adjustments are for agencies are one-time, then we’re going to have the same conversation again.”

He noted for the additional funding, only 1/20th is ongoing funding.

The $727.7 million is that much more over the $644 million 2026 plan.

County Executive Jeff Richardson explained last week on WINA Morning News why the costs are growing.

“The first thing is we’re going to take care of our capital debt obligations, which is basically the county’s mortgage,” Richardson said. “So right now, when you look at our current CIP [Capital Improvement Program], we’re going to pay for the courts complex, the land we purchased out at Rivanna for future economic development, and three news schools: Mountain View Upper Elementary, Ace Academy at Lambs Lane and North Feeder Pattern.

“In addition to that, we have to pay for really good people to work in our organization, we need to keep market salary, we need to be able to recruit and retain just like private sector with a focus on public safety. Because, again, those calls for service are continuing to increase and that’s a big deal.”

He said there are also contractors work for the county, so the county needs to take care of those obligations and are doing multi-year budgeting.

Demands continue to rise for K-12 education as well. Richardson makes sure to tell people 52-cents of every dollar coming into the county goes toward the schools.

“That’s the design of local government in the schools is that we’re responsible for paying a significant amount of what they do every day,” he said, “and they’ve got a lot of work to do in our county every day to educate our kids.”

Tax rates approved were 89.4-cents for every $100 assessed for the real property tax, $4.28 per $100 assessed for the personal property tax, 9% transient occupancy, and 6% food and beverage.