Va. Neighbors Quarrel Over Funds
By Eric Lipton
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, January 4, 1998; Page B02
Each year, Fairfax, Arlington, Alexandria, Falls Church and Fairfax City divvy up about $90 million in state funds to help pay their share for Metrorail and Metrobus service. Fairfax has 73 percent of the population of the member communities of the Northern Virginia Transportation Commission, but it gets only 55 percent of the funds.
"Somebody help me understand -- except in maybe the old Soviet model -- how this is fair," said Fairfax Supervisor Gerald E. Connolly (D-Providence). "This is an abomination that has been allowed to continue for far too long."
Leaders in Arlington and Alexandria aren't pleased with Fairfax's pitch for more money. Increasing Fairfax's share of the funds to reflect its population would mean a loss of as much as $13 million a year for Arlington and Alexandria combined, forcing them to cut back bus service or find more local tax dollars to pay their transit bills.
"All this does is inject an unnecessary and distracting note of divisiveness in Northern Virginia when we should be working together as a region to address our transportation needs," said Arlington County Board member Albert C. Eisenberg (D), who is the incoming chairman of NVTC. "It just rips open a variety of wounds."
Alexandria Mayor Kerry J. Donley (D) sent a letter late last month to seven local legislators, asking them to keep the General Assembly out of the dispute.
"Fairfax is trying to go in the back door and get the legislature involved in what is a Northern Virginia squabble," Donley said. "We feel very strongly that this is a local issue that we must resolve among ourselves."
Fairfax gets 55 percent of the annual transit grants as a result of a complex formula that relies largely on how much the communities spend on Metrobus and Metrorail service. On a per-capita basis, smaller Arlington and Alexandria spend more money on rail and bus service, so they get more in grants.
"There is logic to the formula. It rewards efforts by the inner jurisdictions to emphasize public transit," said Mark B. Jinks, Arlington's director of management and finance.
But Fairfax officials say they would have a more extensive public transit system -- increasing bus service in the Fairfax Station, Reston, Centreville and Burke areas -- if they had more state aid to help foot the bill.
"I understand why Arlington and Alexandria would not want these issues to be addressed, but there is an equity issue here that has to get some attention," said Fairfax County board Chairman Katherine K. Hanley (D). "We are trying to expand our transit services and we need these additional funds."
Fairfax has asked the legislature to take three steps.
First, because a large chunk of the state aid comes from a 2 percent gasoline tax paid by Northern Virginia residents, Fairfax wants back all of the money it puts in. That would mean that 70 percent of the $12.5 million in gas tax revenues would go to the county, because 70 percent of all the gasoline is sold in Fairfax.
Second, it wants the state to directly allocate the other grants, removing the power from NVTC, again in an effort to get more of the funds, which totaled $91 million last fiscal year and $74 million this fiscal year.
Finally, the county wants the state to give it more seats on the NVTC board to reflect that it is by far the largest jurisdiction in Northern Virginia. Currently, Fairfax has five of the 13 local government seats on the body.
If Fairfax's proposed formula had been in effect for the last five years -- giving it about 70 percent of all the funds -- the county would have received about $70 million more in state aid, including an additional $13 million this fiscal year.
That would have meant $70 million less for the other jurisdictions, a 40 percent cut in their state funding. Jinks said the loss would be hard to handle.
"We are not sitting here with dollars that are unallocated," he said. "You either have to cut transit services, other county programs like schools, or you would have to raise taxes."
Rep. Vincent F. Callahan (R-Fairfax) said he is ready to go to battle to try to get the county more transit money.
"Arlington and Alexandria should not dictate what Fairfax County gets," Callahan said. "We have about 25 members of the legislature that represent at least part of Fairfax, and we are going to make sure we get our fair share."
But Sen. Mary Margaret Whipple (D-Arlington) said the dispute is local and should be resolved in Northern Virginia, not Richmond. Several local leaders in Arlington and Alexandria said they are willing to negotiate changes in the formula that governs distribution of the aid, but they want to do it voluntarily, not under orders from Richmond.
"We have already been able to resolve our regional issues regionally," Whipple said. "That is the best way to do it."
Arlington board member Eisenberg said Fairfax could severely damage relations among Northern Virginia jurisdictions.
"When you get into that kind of a game, you can lose as much as you gain," he said.
© Copyright 1998 The Washington Post Company
