Opinion: Supervisors should curb appetite after spending $12,500 on food

It’s easy to spend money when it’s not your own.

At the last Prince William County Board of Supervisors meeting of 2023, I spoke to the board about the massive cost of feeding board supervisors during their meetings. I showed a video of county residents waiting in food pantry lines.

Talking to some of the organizers of these charities, they tell me they try to serve everyone, but there are many occasions when more people are looking for help than they can serve, and they regularly must close the pantry lines. The board appeared to listen intently to what I was saying. Still, to my dismay, outgoing Chair Ann Wheeler announced that the board would be going to Los Toltecas Bar and Grill in Woodbridge for dinner between the day and evening sessions.

Employees of the county’s social services department tell me that comparing the last full years of the Stewart and the Wheeler boards, the amount of first-time public assistance requests of Prince William County residents rose 48.5%.

Despite their ability to put food on their table, those seeking public assistance are still required to pay the county real estate and personal property taxes. Those tax rates are set by the supervisors who are eating for free using money paid by people who can’t put food on their tables. I

It’s a circle of craziness that is only made more surreal when you realize that unpaid tax debt can subject people to civil and criminal sanctions.

Public records of the Board of Supervisors’ expenditures from January through November 2023 show they spent $12,548.28 taxpayer money on food for 19 meetings. That averages to $82.55 per supervisor per meeting.

As you can tell by the price tag, they are not eating burgers or pizza. They eat from restaurants like Carrabba’s, Los Toltecas, Bonefish Grill, Firebirds, Texas Roadhouse, and the Cheesecake Factory.

Adding to the cost, the Wheeler Board required county staff to have lunch waiting in the board chambers despite not starting work until well after lunch at 2 p.m. To add insult to taxpayer injury, sometimes the board decided to go out to eat, even though the county had already purchased food for them, making taxpayers pick up the tab twice.

Why does the public pick up the tab for their meals in the first place? Last spring, the board gave itself a sweeping pay raise – 70% in the case of the chair’s salary.

There are so many meal options from delivery to door dash where each supervisor can choose to order their food for themselves.

County Executive Christopher Shorter and county attorney Michelle Robl, two of the top 3 highest-paid county employees, are also having their meals provided for them by taxpayers during these meetings.

Shorter hasn’t been here a year and just got 6% and 3% raises. His annual salary is more than $380,000, and he also gets a luxury car allowance and deferred compensation of an additional $20,o000 a year.

This makes his salary more than 10 times the salary of the average Virginian. He still eats for free on Tuesdays.

If it’s too much of a bother to order food separately, why not reimburse the county for the food they’ve purchased?

Hopefully, the incoming At-large chair, Deshundra Jefferson, will put a “Pantry closed” sign over the supervisors’ excessive meal spending because the people can no longer afford a ruling class; that’s why we ousted Ann Wheeler.

Alan Gloss
Coles District