It’s disappointing to see a continued effort to mislead the voters of James City County about the proposed government center. Despite attending multiple meetings on the project, some have chosen to make claims that they must know to be untrue. Let’s just take a few minutes to set the record straight.
James City County’s current government campus outside the gates of Kingsmill was largely built 50 years ago, when the county’s population was about 15,000. Today, with a population of 85,000 and a wider range of governmental programs and services, the county needs modern spaces for its employees and citizens.
The county decided to do a space-needs study, specifically to evaluate the options available to us. It was possible to expand, renovate, repair and replace existing facilities, but the result would be a patchwork of spaces that would again likely be outmoded in 20 to 30 years, and at considerable cost. Our study showed us that we could build a new, centrally located government center for just about the same price, but which would allow us to meet the county’s needs for the next 50 years.
The discussion led to a proposal by a development team of architects and contractors to design and build a new center for a fixed price. That was their right under state law, and the board agreed to consider the plan, which triggered a 120-day period where the county solicited other, competing proposals. We received one other bid, and after analysis of the two proposals, we selected the first team to move forward with the initial design. At each step, decisions were made in public meetings, with notice in agendas and backup material linked to the agendas online.
We know that not everyone gets the newspaper and that many people have other priorities than to follow local government decisions regularly. But public notice was provided at multiple meetings, through press releases, social media posts and dozens of news articles in print and online. As it turned out, one of the most vocal critics of the proposed center actually came to a Board of Supervisors meeting to praise the concept and to urge us to open the bidding again, well after the 120 days of ads, so that he and others could submit proposals. He even had an animated film to show his vision for what he saw as a great opportunity for the county. In any case, hundreds of residents did attend presentations on the center and seemed to be satisfied that this was a good proposal.
No, and anyone attending the meetings should know that. The cost of the center will be approximately $179 million, slightly less than the cost of Warhill High School, adjusted for the inflation that has occurred in the more than two decades since that project was completed. By locating the center adjacent to the JCC Recreation Center on county land, we save the cost of site acquisition. By co-locating a long-planned branch library connected to the center, we are cutting the cost of that facility in half.
The Board of Supervisors carefully considers our budget and debt capacity. We have in place policies that are more conservative than expected by bond rating agencies. We informed the three major Wall Street bond rating agencies of our plans, and they all continued to provide us with excellent ratings, which determine the interest rates on money we borrow. Some of the money for the construction has been saved over the past few years in order to prepare for future expenses. That future is now.
Our analysis has shown us that the borrowing for this project (and others in our Capital Improvement Budget) will not require an increase in our tax rate. We do not expect that property values have increased by anything close to the rates of the last few years. We assess every other year, and our revenues are not drawn from real estate values alone. We do expect that factors such as sales tax revenue will continue, that there will be other revenue sources such as new industry coming to the county’s commerce parks, and that over the next couple of years our revenues — not our residential property taxes — will increase by 3% in non-assessment years and 7% in assessment years.
I have heard from so many people that they love living in James City County, and that they appreciate the investments in saving agricultural and open space, providing excellent services such as parks and libraries, and that we are working to address our citizens’ needs in a professional, collegial and thoughtful way.
So, in the end, I would encourage you to carefully research this or any other issue of concern, sign up for notification of board meetings (which will come with a link to the agenda and the backup materials for each public meeting), and as always, reach out to us with your comments or concerns. I know we will listen, even if in some cases you are disappointed with a board decision.
I just hope that you will recognize that we try to do what is in the best interest of the county today and for the future.
