Time to get EDUCATED about ADVOCACY in Albemarle County

Albemarle County voters will face a $35 million question on their ballots this fall as the Democrat-controlled Board of Supervisors today (June 1, 2016) voted — however, not unanimously — to put a school construction bond issue on a November 8 referendum.

The Board’s vote on the amended Capital Improvement Plan (CIP) was 5-1 with Supervisor Rick Randolph (D, Scottsville) voting no. Before the vote, the Board removed $500,000 from the proposed CIP that would have been used for a high school capacity planning study. The amended CIP was recently voted in by the Albemarle County School Board and then agreed to by the Albemarle County Planning Commission by consensus rather than through an actual vote.

Following the Supervisors’ CIP vote today, they then voted 5-0-1 (Supervisor Randolph abstaining) to spend the afore-mentioned $500,000 in high school capacity planning money over two years on a cash basis rather than a borrowed basis within the County’s five-year CIP. The Board wants to see $100,000 of this spent in the FY2017 fiscal year and $400,000 spent in the FY2018 fiscal year. This study will look, in part, at whether to build a new $70 million high school somewhere between the South Fork Reservoir and Airport Road or add onto Albemarle High School at a price tag of $20 million.

In a third and final decision today, the Supervisors voted 4-1-1 to approve a general rather than a specifically-worded referendum question for the November ballot. Supervisor Brad Sheffield (D, Rio) — who wants a new elementary school near Polo Grounds Road rather than a $14 million addition to Woodbrook Elementary School — voted no on the referendum question’s general wording. Supervisor Randolph abstained from voting on the referendum wording.

What most interested me in today’s CIP and referendum presentations and discussions was actually not the vote tallies, but rather the comments once again about the legalities of “educating” voters about a referendum question versus “advocating” for it.

By law, public officials like Supervisors and School Board members and government employees or committee members can only provide facts and information about a referendum topic. They are not supposed to advocate for (or against) a referendum question. Any advocacy must be done only by non-governmental groups (i.e., PTOs) or by government officials in their personal and private capacities rather than as spokespeople for their particular governmental entity or role.

However, what we heard today from Supervisor and Board Chairwoman Liz Palmer (D, Samuel Miller) was a request that Albemarle polling places in November post on the inside walls of the voting precincts large charts of what will be funded if a general obligation bond referendum passes.

How is this only “education” and not crossing the line into “advocacy” when such detail is posted INSIDE the building where voters stand in line to cast ballots?

Will the Supervisors also instruct County staff to put on these same INSIDE walls equally large “educational” charts showing what the tax increase will be if a $35 million referendum question passes?

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying that I’m against the $35 million worth of school CIP projects. All I want is absolute fairness to the proscribed legal process and strict adherence to Virginia law — which requires EDUCATION ONLY, NO ADVOCACY.

All official presentations about the referendum question must be INFORMATION ONLY, NO PERSUASION.

Somehow, I doubt that the Albemarle public will only hear EDUCATION and INFORMATION from County officials about the November referendum. I believe they will also mix in a healthy dose of ADVOCACY and PERSUASION.

Case in point from today’s meeting. Supervisor and former School Board member Diantha McKeel (D, Jack Jouett) had the following to say about promotion of the referendum question: “It’s going to be on the School Board to really get out there and fight for this.”

McKeel’s admonition that elected School Board members “really get out there” and that they as a group “fight for this” is most definitely an ADVOCACY stance. The School Board is an official governmental body that, by law, is prohibited from doing what McKeel advocates in her remark.

Finally, if you’re FOR passage of Albemarle County’s amended CIP and the additional $35 million in school construction projects, know that it will cost you 1.3¢ more on your real estate tax rate in FY2018. This is in addition to 1.0¢ more already targeted for your real estate tax rate in FY2017 and 2.1¢ more on your real estate tax rate in FY2019.

And by the way, all of this is before any new Operating Budget recommendations for FY2018 and FY2019 from the County Executive and any potential increases in your real estate assessments.

The public might want to get EDUCATED now about ADVOCACY in Albemarle County before November 8 rolls around.