HomeMy Public PortalAboutTOL NR 2020-03-25 FY 2021 budget adoption
Town of Leesburg
News Release
For Immediate Release
Wednesday, March 25, 2020
Media Contact:
Betsy Arnett, Public Information Officer
barnett@leesburgva.gov 703-771-2734
Leesburg Town Council Adopts Fiscal Year 2021 Budget,
Maintains Real Estate Tax Rate at 18.4¢
Staff prepare for downturn in revenue.
Leesburg, VA (March 25, 2020) – On Tuesday, March 24, 2020, the Leesburg Town Council
adopted the real estate tax rate for the 2020 calendar year and approved the Fiscal Year 2021
Budget and the revised Fiscal Year 2020-2025 Capital Improvements Program (CIP). The Council
maintained the current real estate tax rate of 18.4¢ per $100 of assessed value.
“The Town’s Budget and Finance staff are closely monitoring the impacts of the coronavirus
crisis on the Town’s revenues, but it is too early to say definitively how severe the impacts will
be since many of the Town’s revenues are received quarterly or late in the year,” said Clark
Case, Leesburg’s Director of Finance and Administrative Services. “The Town is already taking
measures to offset expected revenue losses in the fourth quarter of the current fiscal year,
including cancelling all travel and other cost-cutting. We are actively looking at further cost-
saving measures as the effects of the coronavirus crisis deepen. Those effects may require
amendments to the newly adopted Fiscal Year 2021 budget.”
The adopted Fiscal Year 2021 General Fund Budget, including debt service, totals $62.5 million
which is a 3.9% increase over Fiscal Year 2020. As the second year of the two-year budget cycle,
the Town Council considered only essential changes from the proposed budget that they
provisionally approved last year. The only enhancement included in the General Fund budget is
a new Senior Systems Analyst in the Information Technology Office, funded for half the year
and starting in January. The remaining increases to the General Fund budget are increases in
costs needed to maintain current levels of service, including funding for the six full-time
positions added in the Fiscal Year 2020 budget but only funded for six months and a mandated
increase in the Town’s contribution to the Virginia Retirement System.
In addition, the Council adopted the revised Fiscal Year 2020-2025 Capital Improvements
Program (CIP). The CIP includes 63 projects, totaling $232 million over the six years of the
program. For Fiscal Year 2021, the CIP is $58 million and includes 17 projects. Major capital
projects that will be under construction in Fiscal Year 2021 including the Route 7/Battlefield
Parkway interchange, the widening of Evergreen Mill Road, the expansion of the Police
Department building on Plaza Street, and improvements at Veterans Park at Ball’s Bluff.
The newly adopted Fiscal Year 2021 Budget and the Fiscal Year 2020-2025 Capital
Improvements Program will be available for download from the Town’s website at
www.leesburgva.gov/budget within the next month. The proposed budget document is
available now.
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