Henrico officials review bond referendum items with citizens
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Henrico officials held a meeting Sept. 6 to review with citizens the county’s bond referendum that will be on the November ballot.
At the meeting, held at the Henrico County Western Government Center, officials outlined the projects that the referendum is slated to fund. The majority of the referendum, which totals $511.4 million, would go toward schools, while the rest would be used for public safety facilities, drainage infrastructure, and parks.
If voters approve all four referendum questions on the ballot, the county will be able to issue bonds to pay for the projects. Each question will ask voters whether the county should be authorized to contract a debt and issue obligation bonds to the maximum amount for schools, public safety facilities, drainage infrastructure, and parks.
Voters overwhelmingly passed the county’s last bond referendum in 2016, which funded the construction of new versions of J.R. Tucker and Highland Springs high schools, among other projects.
But this year, county officials must find support during an election without a big-ticket race – and one that begins earlier than in the past, with absentee voting starting Sept. 23. Although few locals attended the meeting on Tuesday, it was one of about 140 meetings county officials said they have organized about the referendum.
“We'll go in someone's backyard, we will go into a Sunday school class, we will come into our living room, restaurant, Rotaries,” County Manager John Vithoulkas said.
Henrico Finance Director Sheila Minor boasted about Henrico's financial status. The county has a triple AAA bond rating, which Minor said is one of the highest credit ratings a locality can achieve. This means purchasing bonds will be low risk, she said.
Minor emphasized that the plan would not affect the county’s tax rate.
“This referendum plans out debt loads in such a way that new debt comes on as old debt is paid off, keeping our debt load and therefore our cash flow consistent from year to year,” Minor said.
Education plans
About $340 million of the referendum is dedicated to schools. Lenny Pritchard, chief of operations at Henrico County Public Schools, told attendees about the eight projects spread across the county that include the rebuilding or renovation of Jackson Davis Elementary, R.C. Longan Elementary, Highland Springs Elementary, Charles M. Johnson Elementary, and Quioccasin Middle School.
County officials also plan to build two new elementary schools in the Fairfield District and the West End, where existing schools are already filled to capacity, Pritchard said. He said the most exciting project funded by the referendum is a new environmental science building, which will be on land donated by the county at Wilton Farm in Varina.
A study by an outside company helped the school division determine which buildings needed rebuilding or renovating, Pritchard said. Kristi Kinsella, the Brookland District representative on the Henrico School Board, was in attendance at the meeting and said the board also considered programming and enrollment needs to determine the projects.
Public safety components
About $83 million from the referendum would address public safety infrastructure. There are plans to rebuild fire stations 1, 6, and 11, and renovate fire stations 14, 15, 16, and 17.
In addition to updating outdated fire stations, $18 million would be used to build a new public safety training center. The center would help prepare fire and emergency services personnel for the more urban development trends and be the only of its kind for at least 100 miles, Henrico Fire Chief Alec Oughton said.
“We anticipate a lot of partnerships with our entire public safety team, regional fire departments, and regional law enforcement as well,” Oughton said.
Oughton also spoke about a new proposed animal shelter and adoption center on Kain Road in Short Pump, which would cost $15 million of the funds for public safety projects.
Other components
For the county's Division of Recreation and Parks, improvements to Three Chopt District parks and roads, Deep Bottom Park, and Tuckahoe Creek Park would be funded by the referendum. Among the projects: sports fields in the Three Chopt area and improvements to the boardwalk at Tuckahoe Creek Park.
About $50 million is allocated for flood prevention and drainage projects. The last time a drainage bond referendum passed was in 1964, said Henrico Public Works Director Terrell Hughes. Since then, the county has logged more than 7,000 drainage complaints and now has 1,200 houses in the floodplain and 70 roads with recurring flooding, he said.
Henrico separates its bond referendum priorities on the ballot, which Vithoulkas called the “most democratic” way to conduct a bond referendum. That means that voters could approve one referendum question but vote down another.
Approved funds legally can be used for other projects, but Vithoulkas said that “morally” would not happen. However, if projects take longer to complete, they are more expensive than originally estimated, he said, in which case additional funding sources would need to be identified.
If the community does not vote for referendum measures, the county must find other funding or kill the projects. Since bonds are the cheapest way to finance large projects like those proposed, they likely would not move forward, Vithoulkas said.
