From the Richmond Times-Dispatch: Local government wish lists:
Local governments, like industries and other special-interest groups, have their own requests heading into the 2008 General Assembly session. The following are some requests of local officials in central Virginia.
[…]
Caroline County
- Supports requests of Virginia Association of Counties
Uh-huh…you couldn’t come up with anything original or specific?
How about money for emergency services? A new radio system, perhaps? How about money for the Sparta Fire Station?
Money for the Dawn Wastewater Project, perhaps?
Funding for a full-time Commonwealth’s Attorney?
Meanwhile, here are some other counties’ concerns:
Amelia County
- Impact fees in areas other than transportation
- Support for local regulation of plastic bags
- Funding for conservation easements and open-space preservation
Charles City County
- Funding to design a new library
Chesterfield County
- Transportation funding, protection of cash proffer and impact-fee authority
- $358,000 for a mental-health and drug-treatment program for pre-trial detainees; a staffing review for sheriff’s deputies and other constitutional officers, and funding for a pre-release center at Riverside Regional Jail
- Assistance with effects of illegal immigration and authority to require businesses to certify that they do not employ illegal immigrants
- A DUI court for Chesterfield and Colonial Heights
Colonial Heights
- Supports requests of Crater District Planning Commission and Virginia Municipal League
Cumberland County
- Revisions to formula for school funding
- Funding for High Bridge State Park project
Dinwiddie County
- Supports requests of Virginia Association of Counties and Virginia Municipal League, and infrastructure funding from effects of Fort Lee expansion
Goochland County
- Widen U.S. 250 from state Route 623 past state Route 621
- Money to improve primary and secondary roads
- Money for broadband
- Relief from a requirement of at least four residential units per acre in planned urban-development areas
- Designation of wild turkeys as big game
Hanover County
- Funding for Hanover Juvenile Drug Treatment Court
- Increase income limit from $50,000 to $62,000 for eligibility for elderly and disabled real estate tax-relief programs
- Authority to prohibit soliciting of people in vehicles in public rights of way
- Allow sharing of registered vehicle information with third parties for the issuance of summons and court proceedings
- $10 million to replace Lewistown Road bridge
Henrico County
- Increase state payments for Henrico’s road maintenance to levels provided to cities and towns
- Authority to prohibit soliciting on all highways
- Authority to establish a stream-restoration bank, allowing the sale of tax credits to offset restoration costs
- Increase the threshold when an environmental impact report must be submitted for road construction and other major projects — the request would require reports for projects costing at least $500,000, up from $100,000
Hopewell
- $98,785 for annual rent and debt payment and $5 million for a new social-services building
- $1 million for economic development and revitalization in downtown
- Funding to help meet water-quality mandates
- $250,000 to plan new fire station and emergency-operations center
- $300,000 for homeland security at the port and dock area
King William and King and Queen counties
- Eliminate Coleman Bridge toll
- Money for services and programs for troubled youths
- Relief from monitoring requirements of local landfills
Louisa County
- Funding for social services and schools
- Allow the collection of impact fees from developers to pay for infrastructure beyond roads
- New revenue sources for transportation and no shifts of maintenance and construction costs to localities
New Kent County
- Allow mandatory connection to water and sewer systems
- Authority to regulate well construction and water quality
- Authority to require screening of automobile junkyards
- Funding to replace Heritage Public Library
- Money for lease or construction of a human-services building
Petersburg
- Money for at-risk student incentive programs, police and local administration of Comprehensive Services Act
- Increase registration fee for vacant buildings from $25 to $100
- Tighter regulation of payday-loan businesses, capping interest rates at 36 percent
- Funding for infrastructure needs of localities affected by Fort Lee expansion
Powhatan County
- Expand tax-relief program for the elderly and disabled to increase income limit from $52,000 to $62,000 and to set a maximum net worth at $350,000
- Funding for Powhatan State Park on the Historic James project
Prince George County
- Continuation of moratorium on annexation
- Funding to assist localities with effects of Fort Lee expansion
- No caps on assessed values of real estate
- Support for U.S. 460 relocation alternative that does not restrict access to Crosspointe Centre or Southpoint Industrial Park near U.S. 460 and Interstate 295
- State code changes allowing local sanctions for violation of closed-session confidentiality
- Support for a northbound entrance ramp onto Interstate 295 from Chudoba Parkway in Crosspointe Centre and Southpoint Business Park
- Careful consideration and local input on effects of proposed Homestead Exemption
Richmond
- Funding for combined sewer-overflow project, police, Port of Richmond, mental-health treatment services and juvenile crime prevention
- Increase payments in lieu of real estate taxes for state-owned properties
- Simplify foreclosure process on blighted, tax-delinquent properties, authorize tax on vacant properties with proceeds benefiting an affordable-housing fund, eliminate the ability for reduced assessments based on the property’s condition
- Exempt Richmond from localities subject to a moratorium on jail planning and construction
- Study whether violent crimes committed in the presence of children should be considered in sentencing guidelines
Sussex County
- Money for schools
- Assistance with economic development
- Money for programs to install indoor plumbing and rehabilitate homes
“Stop thinking and follow me.”