Politics & Government

Council Lowers Real Estate Tax Rate

Stormwater rate is cut in half.

Fairfax City councilmembers voted unanimously to set the FY2012 real estate tax rate at 93.7 cents and halve the 1 cent originally proposed to fund stormwater projects at a budget meeting Thursday night.

Property owners in the city limits will pay 94.2 cents per $100 assessed value next year.

discussion with a recommended $1 real estate tax rate, 4.5 cents above the current rate. Since then, the City Council have made cuts to department budgets and split the proposed 1 cent stormwater rate in half.

Find out what's happening in Fairfax Citywith free, real-time updates from Patch.

The halved cent will provide $390,000 for stormwater maintenance projects. 

Mayor Rob Lederer said the FY2012 budget process was a difficult one, though not as dire as it could have been.

Find out what's happening in Fairfax Citywith free, real-time updates from Patch.

"Things started to look up, but we've a long way to go before we're out of the woods," he said after the vote.

Council members cut over $1.2 million from department budgets to reach the approved real estate tax rate. Some of those changes include clipping the minimum fund balance to 10 percent from 10.2 percent, a savings of about $200,000; and freezing salary and benefits for a Parks and Recreation Department position, $57,000. 

Many of the budget changes came from updated trend and collections data.


Get more local news delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for free Patch newsletters and alerts.

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here