Finance and Budget Committee - Part II - Oct 14, 2025

meeting

Prince William County Finance and Budget Committee 1h 11m 3 speakers 3 agenda items transcribed 6 days ago official recording ↗

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What budget outlook did Dave Sinclair present at the start of the meeting?

Andrea O. Bailey 3:28

Mr. County Exec. All

Unknown 3:30

right. Thank you very much, Chair Bodie, members of the committee. So that was and I want to just take an opportunity to thank Tim and thank really the entire finance team for the presentation and for all the work that they're going to do in terms of the budget season ahead. I want to turn it over to Dave Sinclair, our acting deputy county executive, to walk us through the budget outlook. So this will give really a picture in terms of some of the decisions that the board has already made, pressures that we know we will have coming into this budget season, and to give the board sort of where we will start this season in terms of assumptions made as part of the board's adoption of the budget just a few months ago.

Unknown 4:16

So Dave, I'll turn it over to you.

Dave Sinclair 4:18

Good morning, Chair Bodie, members of the committee, Dave Sinclair, Office of Management and Budget. What we're going to do this morning with the committee is to quickly review FY25 agency surplus budget performance, both from an expenditure standpoint and an agency revenue standpoint. We'll quickly review FY2026 budget highlights before jumping into staff's FY27 budget outlook. Quickly, this does not include the general revenue surplus of approximately $11 million that Tim just reviewed with the committee. This is solely focusing on general fund agency surplus from FY25 operations. Please note, this is preliminary. It is pending completion of the audit in November or December. Um, in terms of expenditure savings, general fund agencies saved a $13.1 million.

Dave Sinclair 5:20

Um, that represents about 1.5% of the final budget. However, agency revenue, we fell a little short by $3.5 million. And so the net expenditure surplus Expenditure savings net the agency revenue shortfall. That net is $9.6 million. Okay. Combined with the $11 million that Mr. LeClair mentioned from the general revenue surplus combined, that's about $20 million, a little over $20 million. And as Tim mentioned earlier, we have to do those year-end calculations to maintain reserves in the board's adopted policies of the principles of sound financial management. Staff needs to prepare the committee that it's quite possible that, a significant portion of the operating surplus may go to maintaining existing reserves.

Dave Sinclair 6:36

This slide is another look at the $13.1 million of agency savings. Please note, this is by expenditure category. As you can see, our salary and benefits budget was overspent by $1.4 million, representing less than one half of 1% of the salary and benefits budget. More on that later. Please keep that in mind. This does factor in salary and benefit is the net result of $21.2 million of budgeted salary lapse. And I know we talked a little bit about this last year. This is baked in savings built into the budget already. If it were not for budgeted salary lapse, the expenditure savings would have been almost $34 million instead of $13.1 million, okay? All right, moving on to fiscal year 2026 budget highlights.

Dave Sinclair 7:43

I will not spend a lot of time on this slide. I believe Mr. LeClair already did that moments earlier. I will just say that the personal property tax rate on vehicles, that tax rate reduction was the first reduction in the tax rate in about 35 years. The last time the board voted to reduce that tax rate, I believe, was all the way back in fiscal year Expenditure budget highlights in the FY26 budget. Let's just talk about expenditure funding. The transfer to the schools increased $80.6 million. That is a healthy increase of 8.8% over the prior year. And the three year increase is a very, very, uh, excellent, uh, almost $277 million or 38.7%. Uh, over that three year increase in the transfer to the schools.

Dave Sinclair 8:58

Uh, so significant investments made in Prince William County schools by the board. The FY26 budget included almost $10 million in technology improvements that consists of infrastructure, hardware refresh, and security upgrades, technology improvement plan, as well as contractual increases to existing technology the county already has. Collective bargaining agreements were fully funded for both fire and rescue and police at a cost of $8.3 million.