F.C. Looking for Revenue in Big & Small Places

The Falls Church City Council was in informal agreement Monday that it should implement a tax rate cut in the Fiscal Year 2005 budget it is now considering. The only question is how much.

The City of Falls Church mailed out 2004 real estate assessments to every property owner in the City yesterday, expected to land in mail boxes today. As reported earlier, the red-hot real estate market in Northern Virginia, combined with some corrections in Falls Church as a result of a fresh outside appraisal of every property earlier this year, is resulting in an overall average 25% increase in assessed values.

To offset that increase, the Falls Church City Council and City staff are pouring over the proposed Fiscal Year 2004-05 budget with a fine tooth comb, looking for ways to shave some pennies off the real estate tax rate.

In addition to the costs of maintaining existing operational services, the budget is burdened by a $2.5 million debt service payment as the first installment on the $25 million in bonds the City sold this month to finance the construction of a new middle school. That was supported by 75% of City voters in a referendum last fall.

It is also burdened by the fiscal gridlock in Richmond and funding cuts at the state and federal level, combined with pressures from continued robust enrollment growth in the City's public school system and a sudden major increase in the City's obligation to the Virginia Retirement Fund for school employees.

But still, help comes in big and little places. The big one, of course, is the jump in real estate values. While that reflects a whopping growth in the wealth and financial leveraging power of City property owners, it is hardly enough, alone, to cover the increased costs in this fiscal year's $56 million budget.

One smaller, but surprising area of revenue growth has been in the City's photo red light system. The FY05 budget projects $600,000 in revenue from the system, which is aimed at electronically identifying and fining motorists for running red lights at three intersections in the City.

The revenue yield from this program is way above the City's original expectations. For example, in its first year of operation from July 1, 2002 to June 30, 2003, it was projected to yield only $153,748, but actually brought in $454,008.

This year, it was again projected to bring a low number at $275,000. While the actual number won't be known until the fiscal year ends in June, yields to date have led the City Manager to project $600,000 from the system in the next fiscal year.

Of course, costs rise with increased revenues, based on the "deal" struck between the City and the private sector operators of the system. The City is also still in the midst of a five-year capital payment plan for the equipment. As a result, the City nets slightly less than half of the gross taken in from the $50 fines levied against ticketed motorists.

Still, the net revenue gain is over a penny on the real estate tax rate, and that amounts to a lot in cash-conscious times.

City Manager Dan McKeever assured the News-Press in an interview yesterday that Falls Church's system makes sure that only obvious violators are ticketed. This is because a video camera, rather than a still photo, is used.

Only if a car is captured on video cross the white line after the light has turned red will that car be ticketed, he said. Tickets received in the mail usually show snapshots, taken off the video, of the car behind the line with the line turned red, going over it with the light turned red, and a close up of the license plate.

Of the three intersections where the red light system has been operating, the most infractions have been ticketed at the Annandale and W. Broad intersection and the W. Broad at Birch Street crossing.

The third location, at the intersection of Annandale and Hillwood, has not yielded a high number, so McKeever said plans are afoot to move the system. Half of the four photo systems set up to capture violators going in all directions at that location will be moved within a month to the intersection of East Broad at Cherry Street, he said. The other half will go the intersection of S. Washington St. at Oak.

Still more net revenue is expected to be coming into City coffers when a new parking enforcement officer hits the streets in the coming months. The officer has already been hired by the Falls Church Police Department and is currently in training.

The officer's duties will be enforcement of City stickers on automobiles parked in the City, as well as enforcement of restricted or no-parking areas. McKeever said that City Hall will have a new parking restriction policy in place in a couple of months to accommodate the concerns of residents residing new the East and West Falls Church Metro stations and in the downtown areas.

McKeever said he's been surprised, "almost shocked," in fact, that the beginning of construction of the new parking garage at the West Falls Church Metro station has not resulted to date in a significant spill-over of Metro parking into Falls Church city streets.

"We absolutely did not anticipate this," he said. "We are mystified to figure out what has happened to all the cars. The temporary spill-over lot constructed across from the high school is barely half full, and there are almost no cars on the lot we put in by the Burger King on West Broad. I suspect that commuters simply reverted to driving into D.C., but I can't be sure."