The Arlington County Board is scheduled to take up numerous items this month, including the financial impact of new public safety contracts, a proposed office-to-residential conversion project and closing out the fiscal year 2025 budget.
Potentially the most controversial item on the agenda could come during the Tuesday, Nov. 18 recess meeting, when Board members decide whether to move forward with a working group to consider changes to Arlington’s 93-year-old governance structure.
Both Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R) and Virginia’s Democrat-majority legislature are claiming credit for this year’s round of tax rebates, but they’re casting them in very different lights.
The rebates, worth up to $200 for individuals and $400 for couples who filed jointly in 2024, will go out to most households by Oct. 15. A message on the checks names both the 2025 General Assembly, which approved the budget, and Youngkin, who signed it into law.
Falls Church officials are breathing a sigh of relief as meals-tax revenue seems to have bounced back from declines earlier in the year.
“We did have a rebound. We’ll continue watching it,” City Manager Wyatt Shields said at the Oct. 3 meeting of the City Council’s budget and finance committee.
A proposed tweak to Arlington’s two-year-old stormwater-fee program could help members of homeowners’ associations save a little money.
County Board members are considering a possible change to the county’s stormwater-credit fee in areas where homeowners’ groups have made specific stormwater improvements. The change, which Board members voted to advertise for an October public hearing, would allow for financial rebates of up to 35%.
An entire professional broadcast studio is going up for auction because of about $70,000 in unpaid debt at Arlington Independent Media, an official says.
Hundreds of professional-grade items — including camcorders, cameras, MacBooks, iPads, microphones, audio mixers, audio recorders, turntables, lighting kits, TVs, desks, chairs, broadcasting equipment and a 360-degree photo booth kit — are up for bidding over the next few weeks.
The process of licensing a dog in Arlington is less onerous than it used to be, but efforts are underway to streamline it further.
Until recent years, dog owners were required to come to the treasurer’s office in person to present the required rabies certificate and pay the fee. More recently, an online option was added, but it remains a two-step process.
Arlington’s tax-delinquency rate ticked up slightly this year, despite the county treasurer’s office’s efforts to address high rates of late payment and non-payment of vehicle taxes.
The delinquency rate of 0.18% was up from 0.17% last year and above the goal of 0.16% set by Treasurer Carla de la Pava.
After nearly two hours of trash talk, Falls Church City Council leaders have settled on two potential options for funding future garbage collection and recycling services.
Council members have set a Sept. 8 date for a public hearing, and a likely final vote, on the long anticipated switch away from paying for trash collection and recycling services via general taxation.
Arlington’s perpetual cat-and-mouse game with people attempting to avoid vehicle taxes continues.
“There are people who will do anything in their power to dodge the system,” Commissioner of Revenue Kim Klingler says. “It makes you want to find them even more.”
Some projects are behind schedule in the Falls Church capital-improvement program (CIP), but they aren’t facing any major funding challenges.
Of the 37 active projects in the CIP, which range from roadway improvements to sports-field upgrades, 20 are listed as “on target,” six are “at risk” and 11 are “behind target,” according to a quarterly summary.
The Falls Church City Council is considering future changes to the city’s tax relief policies for seniors and people with permanent disabilities.
Council members considered a relatively straightforward staff request on Monday night: updating the city code to include changes that leaders made about two years ago with regards to real estate tax relief.
Virginia’s annual tax holiday returns this weekend, bringing three days of discounted shopping across the state.
Between Friday and Sunday, Arlington’s 6% sales tax will not apply to any of the following items, bought in-store or online.
