A study of real property taxes showed assessments for multi-family residential properties have declined for the first year since 2010.
Multi-family buildings like apartment complexes are classified under commercial real estate rather than residential real estate.
It’s a concerning sign for the City of Alexandria’s budget, with appraisers noting that the value of multifamily properties has often buoyed commercial property values even as the office market collapse dragged it down in recent years.
For many Alexandrians, though, it could mean a more favorable market for renters.
Appraiser Supervisor Annwyn Milnes told Alexandria’s City Council in a meeting earlier this week that the commercial property market is particularly volatile.
“Many changes to commercial tax base were softened by an increase in value to multifamily properties, but this is the first year since 2010 that multifamily saw a decline,” Milnes said.
Multi-family residential property assessments decreased by 2.26% this year.
General commercial assessments decreased by 2.12% and office buildings, the anchor dragging down the commercial property market, dropped by 12.38%.
Warehouse assessments slightly increased, by .47%, while hotels increased from a rough patch by 4.32% and shopping centers increased by 3%.
Alexandria isn’t alone; the multifamily residential market could be struggling — though, fortunately, that could also mean lower rents.
Director of Finance Kendal Taylor said the city saw significant new construction in apartments two years ago. Last year, during the Zoning for Housing discussion, regional housing experts noted that the city’s supply of apartments hadn’t been keeping up with the demand, which was keeping rental rates unaffordable for many Alexandrians.
“Rents are low, and that’s good for our community,” Taylor said. “That’s not necessarily good for income, but the apartments will settle in.”
(Updated at 4 p.m. on Jan. 29) Critics contend that the proposed Alexandria City Public Schools budget shortchanges staff, but that’s not what the superintendent is saying.
Superintendent Melanie Kay-Wyatt says that her proposed $374 million fiscal year 2025 budget focuses on retention with a full step increase and a 2% market rate adjustment for eligible staff. The school system is currently experiencing a staffing crisis, and the budget also increases bus driver salaries to $24 an hour for new drivers and more than $47 per hour for senior drivers with more than a decade experience with the school system. The budget also opens the door to the creation of a collective bargaining agreement with staff.
At Thursday night’s public hearing on Kay-Wyatt’s budget, Alexandria Middle School teacher David Paladin Fernandez said that the school system needs to come to a collective bargaining agreement. He also said that the budget does not provide a cost of living adjustment (COLA) for staff.
“If I asked everyone in this room if our educators deserved more, I have no doubt that every single one of us would say yes,” Fernandez told the School Board. “We’ve had a record exodus of top-tier educators to surrounding school districts with no plan to address it, and we have members of ACPS leadership suggesting the preposterous idea that a step (increase) is the same thing as a cost of living adjustment… A step is related to my experience and loyalty to the organization and a cost of living adjustment is related to larger economic realities we have no control over. They are not the same thing and they should be recognized in this budget.”
ACPS Chief Financial Officer Dominic Turner said in a Jan. 11 School Board retreat that the school system has seen a lot of turnover in school leadership over the past several years. An ACPS teacher with a bachelor’s degree makes about $58,000 and an ACPS teacher with a master’s degree makes an average of $90,000, and the majority of ACPS teachers are on a Master’s degree scale.
“In the past three years we’ve had 14 new principals and we’ve had 20 new members on the SLT (senior leadership team),” Turner told the Board.
Robin Benatti is the parent of an 8th grader and 6th grader at Francis C. Hammond Middle School, and said at the public hearing that she was “appalled that the budget does not include a COLA.
“This poor decision is going to hurt our students, and further damage our reputation,” Benatti told the Board Thursday. “Teachers in ACPS deserve to make reasonable compensation. This proposal falls short, big time. The struggle to hire qualified teachers for our extremely dense school district will only intensify if you don’t also include a COLA. Be bold. Be aggressive in your position to show the community that you believe in investing in our educational talent.”
Alicia Hosmer has children at Alexandria City High School and at Hammond, and said that a COLA will make the school system more attractive for staff.
“My 8th grader and his classmates have been without an Algebra teacher and their learning is suffering,” Hosmer told the Board. “We cannot recruit and keep top talent when surrounding districts such as Fairfax and Arlington are proposing to give teachers both a COLA and step increases. We will lose more teachers to surrounding districts which means more empty classrooms and more strain on the teachers who remain with ACPS.”
School Board Member Meagan Alderton said at the Jan. 11 retreat that a positive work environment is as important incentive as compensation for staff retention.
“I think pay is 100% essential,” Alderton said. “But we need to be thinking about the job environment we provide to make people want to stay in this profession. There are plenty of people who just love teaching, who love education, and I do believe that if people feel successful in this work, that will also make them stay.”
In the meantime, Board Chair Michelle Rief is concerned that the budget is asking for a 4% increase in the city’s appropriation ($258.69 million) and a 4.1% increase from the state (about $2.5 million), but that the Governor’s proposed budget would transfer only 2-to-3% of requested funding.
“If we don’t receive the state and the city funding that we need, we are not going to be able to pass this budget,” Rief said.
ACPS will hold a public meeting on collective bargaining on Jan. 25. The Board will adopt its budget on Feb. 16, and it will then be incorporated into City Manager Jim Parajon’s budget, which will be presented on March 14.
Another year, another multi-million dollar revenue shortfall in the city’s budget.
In a newsletter, Alexandria Mayor Justin Wilson said the city is seeing gradual growth in real estate taxes. The city is also seeing a return to normalcy in vehicle personal property tax revenues after a surge during the pandemic.
According to the newsletter:
Real estate tax revenues are currently projected to grow by 2.4%, which would be a return to the anemic growth that has characterized much of the last decade and a half. After a pandemic-driven aberration with higher than expected vehicle prices, our staff is now projecting that vehicle personal property tax revenues will return to normal with a modest 1% increase next year.
But while that’s mostly good news for local home and car owners, Wilson said the city is facing a shortfall that requires either spending reductions, a tax increase, or some combination of the two.
During some of the Potomac Yard arena discussions, Wilson and other city leaders said their hope is major commercial developments can help right-size the city’s increasing reliance on the residential tax base as office and commercial markets still suffer post-pandemic.
2024 being a City Council election year might make leaders wary of proposing a tax increase. Wilson announced that he is not running for reelection, but the two current City Council members running for Mayor might be more reticent to support a tax increase months ahead of the primary on June 18.
Yet on the expenditure side of the ledger, we are seeing increases in costs across our balance sheet, driven by new costs for cash capital and debt service to support City and School capital investments, new investments to support student enrollment growth, the costs of regional and local transit services and the impacts of new collective bargaining agreements for our City employees.
Wilson said the current shortfall is around $19 million.
“Given that our local budget must be balanced, that shortfall must be resolved with either spending reductions, tax increases or some combination of the two,” Wilson said.
Wilson said the current adopted guidance asks City Manager Jim Parajon to return to the Council with two budgets, one with a tax rate increase and a scenario that includes a tax rate increase.
The budget presentation is scheduled for Feb. 27.
According to Wilson:
This will be a challenging environment to adopt a budget. With our residential taxpayers already paying more this year due to the appreciation in our residential tax base, I believe we should again work to avoid a rate increase while protecting the core services our residents depend on. Last year was the 7th budget in a row without a tax rate increase and I am hopeful we can continue that pattern.
Two longtime members of the city’s Budget and Fiscal Affairs Advisory Committee (BFAAC) resigned earlier this month after severely criticizing the leadership of Alexandria City Public Schools Superintendent Melanie Kay-Wyatt during a meeting.
BFAAC Vice Chair Kathy Stenzel resigned on Dec. 14 and Board Member Karen Graf resigned on Dec. 16 without providing a reason, according to the city. Graf was chair of the Alexandria School Board in 2013 and 2014, and was a School Board member for six years.
The resignations followed an adhoc Dec. 11 subcommittee meeting, where members were planning an upcoming joint session between city and ACPS staff. In that meeting, Stenzel, Graf and member Laurie McNamara said that Kay-Wyatt is “closed off,” and questioned her leadership style and how effectively ACPS staff work with city staff.
“I was very disappointed when they put her up as superintendent,” said Stenzel, who was on the committee since 2019. ” I think she runs a pretty closed book over at schools. I think it trickles down onto staff, on their comfort with being open on what they’re working on.”
Kay-Wyatt was hired as superintendent in May, after spending nearly a year as interim-superintendent. She was initially hired as the ACPS human resources director in 2021. She took over a post-pandemic school system that was heavily criticized for its poor collaboration with the city, increased safety concerns, teacher and staff retention, as well as learning loss and underperforming standardized test scores.
Kay-Wyatt declined to comment on the subcommittee meeting to ALXnow.
Graf accused Kay-Wyatt of micromanaging communications staff, and said that she was “stunned” last month when she and ACPS Chief Financial Officer Dominic Turner joined City Council’s annual budget retreat on Zoom instead of in person. In that meeting, Kay-Wyatt unveiled the school system’s priorities over the next fiscal year, with one of them being improved collaboration between ACPS and the city.
“I was stunned,” Graf said. “I guess I would be pissed if I was Council, too, because our (School) Board’s used to show up en masse. Definitely all of us were there because we want to show force; that we’re here. We believe in what we’re telling you about the school system.”
In that Nov. 4 meeting, Kay-Wyatt said that her priorities include building partnerships and collaborations with the city.
“We are truly working on building a collaborative energy and a collaborative spirit and relationship with the city moving forward,” Kay-Wyatt said.
McNamara said that criticism levied against Kay-Wyatt is unfair “in a way,” but that ACPS has been tone-deaf by rebranding itself with a new logo while struggling under an avalanche of criticism due to teacher vacancies and collective bargaining issues. She said that the social media comments on the logo change exemplify the issues many see with Kay-Wyatt.
“It is just the essence of tone deafness in this environment,” McNamara said.
Stenzel, Graf and McNamara did not respond to requests for comment.
The next BFAAC meeting is Jan. 16.
Alexandria City Public Schools (ACPS) says school modernization and upgrades are the big focal point of the upcoming Capital Improvement Program (CIP) Budget, particularly at George Mason Elementary School.
In a release, Superintendent Melanie Kay-Wyatt said the priority of the FY 2025 CIP Budget is modernization projects to meet projected capacity needs.
“We have made a strong commitment to cultivating a bright instructional future for our community, and our learning environments and facilities are vital to this priority,” said Melanie Kay-Wyatt in the release. “This proposed budget, which is in line with our projected capacity needs for years to come, is a testament to our dedication to providing ample room and flexibility to support student growth, learning and opportunity.”
The ten-year CIP is $314 million.
The budget summary says the FY 2025 CIP includes:
- $67 million for the construction of George Mason Elementary School
- $10 million for replacement and capacity additions at Cora Kelly School for Math, Science and Technology
- $6 million for renovation of ACPS’ transportation facility
The lion’s share is for the George Mason project, but the budget item noted it was unclear if ACPS could afford new construction or only renovation of the school, which was built in 1939.
“GM has not had major systems updates due to its established timeline and place in previous CIP Budgets,” the budget said. “Reduction in scope directly impacts total capacity of school, square footage, area for amenities, potential for net zero, and introduces timing disruptions. [The] next step is to evaluate if new construction is feasible or if only a renovation is possible.”
A public hearing for the CIP Budget is scheduled for Monday, Nov. 13, at 6:30 p.m.
One month after a study found that the Virginia state government is underfunding schools, Alexandria Mayor Justin Wilson called on state leaders in Richmond to reconsider their approach.
The core issue identified by the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission is that the Local Composite Index (LCI) incorporates local real property, gross income and taxable retail sales to determine how much a locality can fund their school system.
But that calculation for staffing positions doesn’t account for things like regional labor costs, school division size, or students with higher needs, all of which can be higher in Northern Virginia than other localities.
Wilson said in a newsletter that, based on this formula, many Northern Virginia communities are expected to cover 80% of the cost of their schools. Alexandria City Public Schools (ACPS) receive $63.6 million from the state every year, which amounts to a little less than 20% of the operating costs of the schools, while some localities have 83% of the school budget covered by the state.
Virginia school districts as a whole receive 14% less from the state than the national average compared to what those schools are actually spending, or around $1,900 less per student, according to the Washington Post.
“In Alexandria, we have consistently voiced concerns in Richmond about the LCI as an inappropriate tool given that it puts too much emphasis on the purported wealth of a community and too little emphasis on the costs of services required by the student body,” Wilson wrote. “In the case of Alexandria, with a student body with high levels of poverty, English language learners and special education, the costs of educating our students is not represented by the pockets of wealth in some areas of our City.”
The study found that the current formula does not accurately reflect the local education costs. Wilson said he hopes the General Assembly and Gov. Glenn Youngkin will take steps to address this in the next legislative session.
“Bottom line is that their formula essentially treats Alexandria and Falls Church the same, the school system with one of the highest levels of poverty in the state and the school system with the lowest level of poverty in the state” Wilson told ALXnow. “I don’t think that’s fair to our students or our taxpayers.”
(Updated 4:20 p.m.) Alexandria’s School Board is meeting tomorrow for a seemingly innocuous budget revision, but city leaders say the truth is the School Board is walking back a potentially illegal decision made without communicating with the City Council.
Like previous work sessions, a joint City Council/School Board meeting became tense as the discussion turned to funding. The fiscal year 2024 combined funds budget for Alexandria City Public Schools (ACPS) details the revenues and expenditures.
The one-page document has a breakdown of the operating budget for the upcoming FY 2024 school year:
The FY 2024 Operating budget in the amount of $333,442,978 for both revenues and expenditures. This includes other financing sources and uses, as well as a planned use of general fund balance in the amount of $8,722,578, including a transfer out to the Capital Improvement Program of $1,966,021…
One note at the bottom of that section, however, put ACPS in hot water.
The $1,966,021 transfer to the CIP shall be contingent upon the following actions from the City of Alexandria:
- The summer youth employment program grows to a minimum of 200
participants- A partnership with ACPS is established to provide a minimum of 150 students
with employment- Explore increasing the salary for the program from $12/hour to at least $15/hour
to ensure the Alexandria livable wage is met
“There is some language that is technically impossible and inappropriate and so we want to do the adjustments to that motion prior to July 1 so that we are in compliance with our budget expectations and needs,” said School Board Chair Meagan Alderton. “Essentially: the way that the motion reads there are concerns about the use of the word contingency.”
The conditions could be interpreted as holding the funds hostage pending policy decisions from the City of Alexandria, but ACPS officials said that wasn’t the intent. Alderton said the issue came down to a miscommunication between the School Board and the City Council.
“We would be removing language around a contingency for CIP funds which makes it seem like it’s in exchange for our school system and ACPS students having access to youth employment programs,” Alderton said.
A revised version of the fiscal year 2024 combined funds budget excludes the conditions, but at the joint meeting, members of the City Council said they were frustrated and concerned about how the language made it that far through the budget process.
“I’ll put aside the legal aspect for this for a second, which is not insignificant, but this is unfortunate,” said Mayor Justin Wilson. “I appreciate that it’s getting corrected quickly… This was something that in 13 budgets I’ve been a part of I’ve never seen anything like this.”
Wilson said the issue was also raised frustratingly late, with city leaders only being made aware of the contingency on the day of their meeting.
City Council member John Chapman said the contingency and the last-minute meeting to reverse it is further indicative of the strained communications and relationship between the School Board and the City Council.
“I’m trying not to play this up too much, but I think this, along with other conversations we’ve had in this room, seems to be a regular misunderstanding about our respective positions and relationship to each other as different bodies,” Chapman said.
Alderton also raised the possibility of ACPS switching to a revenue-sharing agreement, like Arlington County. Under a revenue-sharing agreement, a percentage of the tax revenue goes directly to the school system rather than being allocated as part of the municipal budget.
“I want to put my plug in for the revenue sharing agreement,” Alderton said. “I know it definitely has to be talked about… I do wonder if a revenue-sharing agreement is a more mature way for us to handle this as a city because it’s difficult for cities where you have a budget as a city and to have the tension about what goes where is challenging. It seems to work in other places.”
Chapman responded that the current conflicts and miscommunications don’t bode well for ACPS responsibly managing a revenue-sharing agreement.
“It can work here as it seems to work in other places, but this example perfectly fits why we are not there yet,” Chapman said. This example highlights why we’re ways away. We have not established systematic communication channels to make sure we are communicating properly and timely and speaking the same language even when we disagree… Folks basically went around Council. They didn’t engage any of the members of the Council and the Mayor just found out. That’s taking several steps back.”
Alexandria City Manager Jim Parajon’s $884.3 million fiscal year 2024 budget was unanimously approved by City Council Wednesday night (May 4), backing citywide pay increases, a fully funded school system and collective bargaining agreements with the police and fire departments.
While the real estate tax rate remains unchanged at $1.11 per $100 of assessed value, city residents will have to pay $308.70 annually for the stormwater utility fee — an increase from $294 last year. The budget, which goes into effect July 1, is an increase of 5.4% over last year’s $839.2 million budget. About 47% of it ($398 million) is dedicated to paying the salaries of 2,765 city employees.
“You’re seeing some some very historically significant investments in public safety,” Mayor Justin Wilson said. “This budget is the first that is informed by the results of two very large collective bargaining agreements.”
City Council Member Kirk McPike said that funding the collective bargaining agreements will help the city fight rising crime.
“Our public safety officers should feel confident that this council has their backs and will continue to invest in these important services,” McPike said. “Those in our city who are worried about the recent rise in certain types of crime (should) take heart that we hear and share your concerns. We’re putting financial resources into ensuring that our police department has the officers and equipment it needs to address this challenge.”
The budget provides:
- A 7% market rate adjustment for sworn fire, medics and fire marshals
- A 6% market rate adjustment for sworn police and Sheriff’s Deputies
- A 2% increase in General Schedule and Sheriff’s Deputy pay scales
- A $4.5% market rate adjustment for non-public safety personnel
- Three new steps in the general pay scale, which is a 7% increase in salary potential
- 25 SAFER grant-funded firefighters
- Funding for Commonwealth’s Attorney staffing for more than $600,000 toward the APD body worn camera program, which launched in April
Parajon faced a $17 million budget shortfall when he started crafting the budget, but it was wiped away by unexpectedly high real estate assessments and $4.6 million in citywide efficiency reductions. He asked all departments for 1.5%-to-2% in budget reductions, with efficiencies like the outsourcing of city employee leave of absence reviews, benefits consulting, and city vehicle fleet repair.
“This adopted budget invests in helping our residents and businesses become more prosperous, safer, more engaged while investing in the infrastructure of our City, and investing in our future with climate action, education, housing and our youth,” Parajon said.
City Council Member Alyia Gaskins says that the budget sends a message to first responders and residents.
“I believe that we are saying to our staff in our fire and police departments that you matter to us,” she said. “We’re saying to our residents that we are committed to recruiting and retaining the best talent to keep you safe through fully funding the operating budget for our schools, and increasing investments in our summer youth employment program, as well as finding ways to waive summer fees for our lowest income residents at our rec centers. We are saying to our young people that you matter to us and we are committed to doing all we can to help you thrive.”
The budget also fully funds the Alexandria City Public Schools $258.7 million operating funds budget request, which will provide 2,600 ACPS employees with a 3% step increase. The request is a 4% increase ($9.9 million) over the FY 2023 budget.
“We have stretched the dollar and been able to keep our tax rate level,” Vice Mayor Amy Jackson said. “Close to a third of our budget is dedicated to our schools.”
Parajon’s budget also provides $2.4 billion in funding for the 2024-2033 Capital Improvement Program, of which $360,788,867 is dedicated for FY 2024.
Funded capital projects this next fiscal year include:
- $282.1 million for the city’s stormwater management systems
- $185.1 million for the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority’s capital improvement program
- $65.6 million to support infrastructure improvements to be construction by the developer at the Landmark Mall site.
- $63.3 for citywide street reconstruction and repaving
- $48.2 for capital infrastructure improvements associated with the Waterfront Implementation Project
- $17.4 million to renovate Four Mile Run Park
Wilson said he’s in favor of a shorter budget process. This year, the City Manager presented his budget proposal in February, followed by two-and-a-half months of City Council work sessions and meetings.
“I will note this was a shorter process,” Wilson said. “Nobody seemed to miss the extra weeks that were part of the process. So, it might give us a path to even further shorten it in the future.”
Last night, the Alexandria City Council unanimously adopted the City’s FY24 Budget. Mayor @justindotnet said “Our budget is evidence of our commitment to the needs of our community.” Learn about how the City is investing in our residents and community: https://t.co/IXlI3piG8b pic.twitter.com/dZL0gULTkk
— AlexandriaVAGov (@AlexandriaVAGov) May 4, 2023
Personal security cameras, speed cameras in school zones, summer youth employment programs and eviction prevention funding are just a few of the final additions included in the fiscal year 2024 budget by the Alexandria City Council on Tuesday.
Council approved funding a $20,000 program to encourage businesses and homeowners with a “small incentive” to set up security cameras to deter crime, as well as increase their coordination with the Alexandria Police Department.
“I like the concept,” Mayor Justin Wilson said. “I think we want our residents to partner with us in providing this kind of neighborhood visibility.”
Other additions include $490,000 for five speed cameras at school crossing zones around the city. Last year, Council approved $400,000 for the speed camera program in five school zones.
Not all of the requests made the final cut. Vice Mayor Amy Jackson’s request to give the Alexandria Commission for Women $20,000 for it’s 50th anniversary event failed to gain consensus.
Council also took $657,629 from the budget that was intended for the Northern Virginia Juvenile Detention Center (200 S. Whiting Street), pending proposals from City Manager Jim Parajon to find alternative uses for the facility, pursue regional partnerships for facility use and optimize capacity for the underutilized space.
The full list of additions to the budget are below.
- Out of School Time Program (OSTP) staffing ($200,000) — This increases paid leave and benefits for part-time staffing with the city’s Out of School Time program.
- Fee waiver for OSTP participants ($15,000) — This would fund a waiver for program participants eligible for SNAP and TANF.
- Speed cameras in school zones ($490,000) — This adds five photo speed cameras to school crossing zones prioritized by the city’s Department of Transportation and Environmental Services
- Childcare services ($50,000) — This will provide child-minding services at City COuncil town hall events, as well as select board, committee and commission meetings.
- Additional eviction prevention funding ($150,000) — This would increase the current funding level of $100,000, all of which will “reasonably assist 40 households in FY24,” according to the city.
- Central coordinator for immigrant affairs/refugee settlement ($110,000) — This would explore a new position or series of positions that could advance efforts to connect immigrant communities with information, resources and services and address the city’s challenges with immigrant populations.
- RPCA Mental Health Pilot position ($75,000) — These funds would go toward developing a Department of Recreation Parks and Cultural Activities pilot program for youth mental health services.
- Summer youth employment program ($214,943) — This would expand the program by 50%, to serve 255 children (85 more than the current program).
- Study for local housing voucher program ($250,000) — This would add funding for a study on a voucher-like program that stabilizes housing and enables access for low-income housholds across the city’s private rental market.
- City library security ($70,000) — This funding maintains library security staffing at current levels.
- Department of Aging and Adult Services ($19,000) — This fills the gap created by Virginia budget formula changed related to the Older Americans Act.
- DASH service line expansion on Line 33 ($120,000) — This would expand DASH Line 33 service from once every 60 minutes to 30 minutes on Sundays, easing connections to the new Potomac Yard Metro Station.
- Visit Alexandria advertising ($78,000) — This additional funding can be used by Visit Alexandria for any sort of media, online or print advertising, either regionally or nationally at their discretion.
- City Council aide compensation increase ($5,300) — This is a 2% scale compensation adjustment.
- Private security camera incentive program ($20,000)
- Continuation of AEDP economic recovery manager ($147,208) — The ERPM is responsible for creating and administering AEDPs Business Association Grant program, which supports Alexandria business associations as well as other ARDP rogramming to promote economic recovery.
- Rental inspection program enhancement ($136,000) — This allows staff to evaluate non-compliant multi-family rental properties.
The budget will be approved on May 3 and go into effect on July 1.
The tense discussions between Alexandria’s City Council and School Board came to a head over Alexandria City High School’s Chance for Change Academy.
The joint work sessions are a chance for the school and city leaders to close the $7.5 million gap between the School Board’s $58.7 million request and the City Manager’s proposed $51.3 funding to the schools in the fiscal year 2024 Capital Improvement Program (CIP). But while both sides agreed relations between the two bodies are better than they’ve been in the past, the conversation still reopened old wounds between the two leadership teams.
Among the items discussed was $2 million in improvements to Chance for Change, listed on the Alexandria City Public Schools’ (ACPS) website as “a temporary placement for students whose matriculation in the traditional setting had been disrupted by various circumstances and also, based on a case-by-case basis.”
“I am not recommending we fund Ferdinand Day’s 5th and 6th-floor renovation. I’m not recommending the capacity for the [Chance for Change] lease space,” said City Manager Jim Parajon. “Those are two projects that are $7.5 million dollars. By my estimation, while they are important and needed, there are other considerations in the capital budget that we must do.”
Alicia Hart, chief of facilities and operations at ACPS, said the Chance for Change Academy cannot grow in the confines of its current space, citing a lack of Americans with Disabilities Act compliance, parking issues, and a lack of outdoor space.
“There’s been a lot of discussion about whether or not we can expand alternative education programs, we cannot do that in our current space,” said Hart. “Every project we put forward in the CIP, from a school standpoint, is a priority.”
The comment sparked an intense back-and-forth between City and ACPS leadership.
“Every project being a priority doesn’t work in a CIP that has to be sustained,” said Parajon. “The bottom line is we have to make choices. I have 20-something departments and everyone is a priority, but it doesn’t work that way. It’s really important that we start to readjust how we think about what is the highest priority: because that’s the thing that has to get funded.”
Parajon noted that the Chance for Change funding was not included in the previous CIP.
“I’m not debating the need, what I’m saying is when we sit down — this is where it has to be a common thought process — it has to be an urgent need when in 2025 we have the largest potential debt service we have to incur,” Parajon said. “We can’t just add to that because there’s no fiscal ability to manage that.”
Parajon and city leadership faced some rebuke from ACPS leaders who said the city wasn’t putting the needs of students first.
“What we’re talking about with Chance for Change is children’s lives and children’s educational needs,” said Interim Superintendent Melanie Kay-Wyatt. “Pushing those down the road is going to further impact academic achievement and social-emotional growth, and I think that needs to be seen very differently than maybe another infrastructure like office space. We’re talking about children who are in need of services… Putting that off a year is going to further put them behind.”
School Board chair Meagan Alderton said that while not funding the expansion doesn’t mean the program will go away, it still keeps the program from being what ACPS has in mind.
“Is it going away if we don’t do something?” Alderton said. “I think the answer to that is no, not immediately. Is it meeting the needs for what we want Chance for Change to be? No, it doesn’t. I think it’s a two-sided question.”
But Alexandria City leadership stuck to Parajon and pointed the finger back at ACPS for ignoring the realities of budget crafting. According to Mayor Justin Wilson:
I’m inclined to agree with everything you said. The problem is I just heard it for the first time a couple minutes ago. [Kay-Wyatt] and I meet monthly… this has never been placed on the agenda. I’ve read through the entire operating proposal: there’s a couple glancing mentions of Chance for Change. I can’t even find on your website how many kids are at Chance for Change right now, and trust me I’ve searched and I know your website pretty darn well.
If there is a story to be told about alternative education and a change in policy and a different direction that requires significant capital investment: last time I checked I’m the Mayor of the city and I don’t know anything about it.
This is a conversation we need to have collectively and jointly before something just shows up in a CIP proposal and we’re told tonight horrible things are going to happen to kids if this proposal doesn’t get funded. That should not be the case and that says something is broken in the process.
The argument came at the end of a nearly three-hour meeting where City Council members repeatedly highlighted areas where there had been insufficient progress on long-term planning collaboration.
From ACPS having better access to the permitting facility to ACPS and City of Alexandria staff potentially sharing office space, City leaders said there are opportunities for greater efficiency that have been woefully underexplored. While ACPS staff said progress is being made, City Council members say it’s time to start seeing results.
“I’ve been around too long to say ‘we have the ability to wait,'” said City Council member John Chapman. “I’m very interested in seeing what we can get done in the next three months and the next six months.”
Chapman said that could involve more meetings or more retreats for City and ACPS leadership to hammer out issues together.
“I do think there are still opportunities for us to have bigger retreat-style conversations,” Chapman said. “We’ve tried that in the past and it’s worked. We need to build that in until we’re marching to the same beat. If we think about sports practice or band practice, if they’re not marching to the same beat, the band director is going to make them practice together, and that’s the way we have to look at it.”
At the end of the meeting, Alderton expressed concerns that the discussions between City leadership and the School Board have focused too much on bureaucracy and not enough on improving the quality of education for Alexandria’s student body:
What is being relayed here tonight — should it have been relayed sooner or later — is that that is a facility and only an example of one of many that is not meeting the actual needs of what we would like Chance for Change to be.
If we’re going to be candid, I think a lot of times we talk about a lot of things other than the actual education of the kids. Maybe a solution we need to get to is all of us, every single one of us, talking more about the education of the kids because we get bogged down in so many different things. If we don’t talk about that, I don’t know how that’s going to change. We get bogged down in facilities we get bogged down in philosophies, but we got to understand the educational needs of these kids and I will tear up right here because of it.
You know one thing I always say: what is the number one thing that the slave master wanted to keep away from the slave? A book. The ability to read. We have fought in this community about everything other than that. What I would say is: yes, let’s talk about all the things, but we gotta figure this out.
For Alexandria City Council members, though, the counterpoint is that bureaucracy is what holds the rest of the system together. According to Chapman:
I appreciate your words, I appreciate your passion: the focus has never changed.
The stark reality is: how we’ve been operating is not necessarily tenable into the near future. It’s not sustainable.
After this meeting, I need how to figure out how to fund what ACPS does, but also what DASH does, how to make sure we can have people of different incomes and different age groups in this community. I don’t want you or anyone to think I’m dismissing what you said. It’s powerful and it’s necessary… but I need to make sure that you have the resources… We’re not going to be able to build what we want without good planning and resources.
The FY 2024 budget is scheduled for adoption on May 3.