ROANOKE, Va. – Roanoke City leaders held a virtual city council meeting on Monday to discuss how the city’s budget will be impacted by COVID- 19.
The meeting began with comments from Timothy Bradshaw, the executive director of the Roanoke-Blacksburg Regional Airport, which is seeing $1 million in lost revenue each month due to the coronavirus. That does not include airport expenses.
Bradshaw said the airport did receive $20.7 million in federal funding through the CARES Act and taxpayers won’t be impacted by the airport’s lost revenue.
As for the FY2021 budget, city leaders tried to make cuts across the board to spread out the impact, including cuts to library services, to human services and maintenance.
The city is expecting $2.3 million in lost local tax revenue for FY2021. The total estimated revenue for Roanoke’s budget is $297,762,036 -- $1,668,964, or 0.56% less than the FY2020 adopted revenue budget of $299,431,000.
The revised FY2021 revenue estimate coupled with an expense estimate of $299,496,582, has resulted in a deficit of $1,734,546.
City leaders are working to reduce expense to provide a balanced budget and create a buffer for future COVID-19 impacts on revenue. Those reductions total approximately $3.5 million and include the defunding of a number of positions, both filled and vacant.
As for FY2020: According to city leaders, just for the remainder of FY2020, the City projects significant decreases in sales tax, transient occupancy tax and meals tax revenues. Local tax revenues are projected to be $9,756,966 less than the FY2020 adopted budget.
In order to combat that, City Administration worked with departments to make expenditure reductions, to hold funding for selected fleet vehicle replacement, and to hold funding for capital projects funded with one-time capital funds. These reductions total approximately $6.4 million. Additionally, they are making adjustments to funding for formula partners, the Roanoke City Public Schools and Visit Virginia’s Blue Ridge. They will see reductions of $3.8 million and $424,000, respectively.
City leaders will adopt the FY2021 budget on June 15.