Stafford School Board members agreed Tuesday night to ask the Virginia General Assembly to pass legislation next year that would provide more money for education in the county.
The School Board voted unanimously in favor of a legislative wish list that consists largely of requesting more state funding from the legislature or seeking the ability to gain more revenue from taxes.
As part of the legislative requests, School Board members are asking the General Assembly, in its upcoming January session, to give the school division more money to pay employees in a labor market that competes with Northern Virginia localities, which typically offer higher salaries.
Those localities receive a “cost of competing adjustment,” or COCA, which means they receive more funding from the state than jurisdictions in other regions. Stafford, because it’s close to Northern Virginia, receives 25 percent of this funding, but School Board members agreed to ask the General Assembly for 100 percent of the adjustment.
The county is also losing more than $20 million a year in real-estate tax revenue due to a large number of disabled veterans are signing up for state-mandated tax relief.
So the School Board agreed to officially register their support for the Board of Supervisors’ request to the General Assembly to receive more state funding to make up for this loss of local revenue.
School Board members are also asking the legislature to allow Stafford to impose a specific sales tax, up to 1 percent, to cover school building construction or renovations if voters approve the measure in a referendum.
A bill that would have allowed localities to do this passed the legislature this year but was ultimately vetoed by Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin. One of the legislation’s sponsors was state Sen. Jeremy McPike, a Democrat who represents part of Stafford.
Though she supported this measure, Hartwood District School Board member Alyssa Halstead said Tuesday in a work session before the board’s regular meeting that she’s skeptical that Stafford voters would support another tax.
She said she understood that the tax wouldn’t be implemented if voters didn’t approve it in a referendum.
“But,” she said, “it’s just one more, the imposition of one more percent out of their pocket.”
At least one other locality in the region, Fredericksburg, supported the 1 percent tax legislation this past year.
Other parts of the Stafford School Board’s legislative wish list included requests for reforming the state’s Standards of Learning tests and for funding for mental health supports in schools and technology infrastructure.
Also on the list was money for federal education mandates.
“And, as we know, there are many,” said Amanda Schutz, the Stafford schools’ chief of staff. “Virginia schools shoulder many unfunded or underfunded mandates.”
