Henrico officials plan $25M budget increase for employee pay adjustments

Henrico employees may be getting more money after all.

The county’s Board of Supervisors Dec. 1 approved the introduction of a budget resolution that would add $25 million to the county’s budget for salary enhancements for county and school system employees. It will vote on the amendment Dec. 15.

The money, Henrico Budget Director Justin Crawford told the board, could be used in one or more ways:
• to address salary compression;
• to provide increases to long-tenured employees;
• to adjust the county’s salary scales;
• to provide raises.

If approved, the money could be used as soon as the third quarter of the current fiscal year (which includes January, February and March) and could extend into the fourth quarter this fiscal year and the first quarter of the coming fiscal year (July, August and September) or some combination thereof, Crawford said.

Funding for the pay increases would come from better-than-expected revenues from several sources, Crawford said:
• $7.5 million more than estimated from bank franchise taxes;
• $5.5 million more in real estate taxes;
• $5.5 million more in local sales and use taxes;
• $5.25 million more in state aid to education;
• $1.2 million more in other state aid.

The current budget, which began July 1, did not include any pay raises for county employees when supervisors approved it in May. That's because officials had slashed the originally proposed budget by $99 million, opting to present a worst-case scenario and adjust throughout the fiscal year if revenues turned out better than that – which they have.

“We are having a very good year as far as estimated revenues,” Crawford said, adding that even with the $25-million addition, the county still would have a surplus of two or three times that amount from tax collections.

“This action is intended to give the Board of Supervisors the flexibility to maintain Henrico’s position as the pay leader in the region,” Crawford said.