September 15, 1997

Arthur Purves, President
Fairfax County Taxpayers Alliance
P.O. Box 356
Fairfax, VA 22030

Dear Mr. Purves:

Thank you for on behalf of the Fairfax County Taxpayers Alliance regarding your concerns about the size of the County budget and the per capita tax burden for County residents. According to your letter, your chief concern appears to be that the size of the budget has increased faster than the rate of inflation and population growth since 1975. While your analysis raises some interesting points, it may not be particularly useful to attempt to compare Fairfax County budgets from 1975 and 1998, for a variety of reasons.

Fairfax County has changed significantly since 1975, as has the rest of the world, and the changes have been far more profound than a simple increase in the number of residents. The relationship between local governments and the State and the Federal government has changed dramatically. New health, safety and environmental concerns have forced Fairfax County and many other institutions to change many of the ways they do business. Fairfax County is no longer a bedroom community for commuters to Washington DC, and the new residents and businesses that have come to Fairfax County have very different expectations for and have placed new demands on their local government. As illustrated in greater detail below, such changes make it difficult to draw many useful conclusions from comparisons of budgets over such a long period of time.

The premise and methodology that led to your conclusions also raise some issues. For instance, although population growth is the most significant factor which drives the need for increased County services, growth in the number of households and employment (both of which have out paced population growth between 1975 and 1997) place additional burdens on County resources. For example, the demand for adequate police and fire services does not track population growth alone, and is in fact more heavily impacted by the growth in the number of households (+94%) and the amount of employment (+161%) in Fairfax County. With more households and offices to protect, more potential fires to put out and more potential targets for burglary, it is not surprising that the cost of those services has increased faster than population growth. Therefore, the notion that an absolute correlation exists between population growth and the need for County services is misleading.

Changing demographics and increased citizen demand for new and enhanced services have resulted in increases in the size of the County budget. For instance, Fairfax County now has one of the highest rates of female participation in the workforce of any locality in the nation. As the number of two-worker households has increased, so has demand for safe, affordable day care service. In 1975 Fairfax County operated eight day care centers serving 411 children. In FY1998 the Department of Family Services will operate 118 School Age Child Care Centers (up 1,375 percent since 1975) serving 6,433 children (a 1,500 percent increase) in its after school program.

The SACC program also raises another important point with regard to your analysis of the Fairfax County budget, which measured the size of the budget as the Total Combined General Fund Disbursements. While the SACC program is subsidized by the County, it is largely paid for with user-fees paid by the parents of participating children. So, while the SACC program will generate $13.5 million in revenue from user-fees in 1998, the entire cost of the program (teacher's salaries, benefits, etc.), including that portion offset by income, will be reflected as disbursements in the General Fund Budget, increasing the size of the Budget as you measure it. Other user-fee supported programs throughout County government also generate revenue to offset the cost of providing services, revenue that, when disbursed, increases the size of the County budget.

In addition to your concerns about growth in the County budget, your letter indicates that you are concerned that, by your calculations, County per-capita taxes have increased more rapidly than the consumer price index resulting in a total of $9 billion in excess spending over the 22 year period you examined. Changes in the relationship between local governments and the Commonwealth and Federal governments since 1975 have shifted the burden for paying for many government services to County taxpayers. In 1975, 26.2 percent of all County revenue came from the Commonwealth of Virginia and the Federal Government. In 1997 that figure had dropped to 12.6 percent. Had State and Federal funding remained stable as a percentage of the budget from 1975 until this year a total of $4.8 billion would have been available to Fairfax County during that same 22 year period.

Despite the pressure to increase the size of County government that comes with new growth and a continually decreasing percentage of State and Federal aid, the Board of Supervisors has actually managed to reverse that trend during the 1990's. If you look closely at the numbers you provided with your letter you will see that while, according to your figures, inflation has increased 23.67 percent since 1990, "per capita taxes", as you define them, have increased only 18.27 percent, and the non-school budget has grown only 9.36 percent per capita. To put it another way, using your methodology, the Board of Supervisors has collected $485 million less in taxes than was required to keep up with inflation and population growth since 1990. By keeping per capita budget growth under the rate of inflation, the non school budget is $124 million less in FY1998 than it would have been had spending kept pace with inflation and population growth since 1990, resulting in a total savings of $874 million during the 1990's.

Thank you again for your letter, and your thoughtful analysis. As you can see, many factors have influenced the rate of budget growth since 1975. I have attached a chart which shows some of the many County services that have been initiated or substantially enhanced to keep pace with changing technology and increased demand from citizens and businesses over the last two decades. I agree that it is important to do everything possible to minimize increases in the size of the budget, as the Board has done during the 1990's. I look forward to working with you in the future as we continue to look for ways to continue this promising trend.

Sincerely,

Katherine K. Hanley

KKH/ms

cc: Members of the Board of Supervisors
Kristen Amundson, Chairman, Fairfax County School Board

	1975	1998
Population	537,200	926573(+72%)
Households	166,400	328469(+97.3%)
Employment	166,457	433772(+161%)
Fire & Rescue
	27 Fire Stations	34 Fire & Rescue Stations
	No Computer Aided Dispatch	5 minute response time goal for Basic Life Support services adopted by Board of Supervisors in 1993
	No ALS program	6 minute response time for Advanced Life Support service adopted in 1993
	No Hazardous Materials Program	Hazardous Materials Emergency Response Team established in 1983, Hazardous Materials division of Fire Prevention established in 1993
	No Mobile Intensive Care Unit	34 units deployed, one for each Fire & Rescue Station. First unit deployed in 1977.
Police
	No Computer Aided Dispatch	6.4 minute response time (Priority 1 calls)
	157,127 calls	521,949 cases & backup calls (+232%)
	No helicopter program	Program instituted in 1982
	No bullet proof vests	All Patrol Officers issued bullet proof vests beginning in 1980
	No Crime Solvers program	Program established in 1979
	No Neighborhood Watch	Program established in 1979
	Cadets trained at a regional Police Academy	Fairfax County Criminal Justice Academy opened in 1985
	No Community Policing	Directed Community Patrols initiate in 1991. First C.O.P.S. grant accepted in 1994
	No School Resource Officers	School Resource Officers stationed in High Schools beginning in 1995. SROs now deployed in most secondary schools
	No Youth Services Division	Division established in 1995 - Gang Investigations Unit added FY1998
Sheriff
	42,168 prisoner days served	274,845 prisoner days served (+550%)
	No Juvenile Detention Center	Juvenile Detention Center opened in 1977
Office for Children (Department of Family Services)
	8 Child care centers	118 SACC centers (+1,375%)
	411 Children participated	6,433 children participate (+1,465%)
Libraries
	17 Libraries, none regional	19 Libraries, 8 regional
	Circulation: 5,106,344	Circ.: 9,500,000 (+86%)
Transportation
	No Office of Transportation	Office established in 1977
	No Metro Rail Service	Metro Rail to Huntington (1984) Vienna (1986), and Franconia/Springfield (1997)
	No Fairfax Connector	Service initiated in 1985
Parks
	No Recreation Centers	8 Recreation centers (Wakefield opened in 1977, Lee in 1980, Mt. Vernon in 1981, Providence in 1982, Oakmarr, Spring Hill, South Run, and George Washington in 1988)
	Fewer than 100 athletic fields	More than 250 athletic fields
Human Services
	No FASTRAN Service	FASTRAN program established to serve transportation needs of elderly and disabled in 1986
	Clinic Room Aides staffed + day per school per week	Clinic Room Aides in every school each day, every hour school is in session
Debt Service
	AA+ Bond rating	AAA bond rating from 3 ratings houses
Assessments & Finance (Dept. Of Tax Administration)
	No seasonal employee support for physical inspection	Program initiated to use seasonal data collection employees to supplement physical inspection data collection efforts and ensure more accurate residential assessments in 1993
	No TARGET program	Program established in 1989