The Stafford County Board of Supervisors had a budget work session on April 28 to hammer down a close-to-final draft of the Fiscal Year 2021 budget.
Cuts are key in the budget with the equalized .97-cent tax Real Estate rate that the Board of Supervisors approved last week. It's an equalized rate that, essentially, keeps tax bills flat, so residents won't pay more in Real Estate taxes than they did in 2020.
“Our vote last Tuesday pinned us in a corner, and I don’t know how we’re going to get out of that corner,” Griffis-Widewater District Supervisor Tinesha Allen said
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Free WiFi is now available in all school parking lots in Stafford County.Â
Lime green signage in all the school parking lots mark where these outdoor WiFi hotspots are available.Â
Users can drive up, park their cars, and access the WiFi from the safety of their individual vehicles.Â
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They sat in silence for three minutes — no one willing to make a motion.Â
The Stafford County Board of Supervisors on during its Tuesday, April 21 meeting had to make a decision on a tax rate in order to ensure the Real Estate tax bills would go out 30 days before the deadline on June 5.Â
In a 5-2 vote, the Board decided to keep the tax rate at the .97 cents per $100 of assessed Real Estate property value. It's an equalizing rate that, essentially, keeps both the tax rate and the tax bills flat, meaning the county won't get any more tax revenues than it did last year. Supervisors Tinesha Allen and Cindy Shelton were the dissenting votes.Â
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Residents will get a chance to comment on Stafford County’s proposed property tax increase at a live broadcasted public hearing on April 21 at 7 p.m.Â
At this meeting, the Board of Supervisors will adopt a budget for the Fiscal Year 2021, which begins July 1.Â
There are two main tax increases factored in the budget.
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There are still no removal plans for the slave auction block located on the corner of William and Charles in Downtown Fredericksburg.
This auction block was the cause of widespread debate in the community, but in July of 2019, the City Council decided that the block would be relocated to the Fredericksburg Area Museum. The costs associated with moving the stone were anticipated to be $30,000.
The relocation was supposed to take place in December 2019, but a lawsuit put a halt to those plans.Â
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Stafford Schools has taken a giant leap by announcing a graduation ceremony for high school seniors, joining Manassas City Public Schools in being one of the first area school divisions to set a date amid the coronavirus pandemic.
The tentative graduation date is August 1 at 8 a.m., but according to Superintendent Scott Kizner, nothing is set-in-stone.Â
“This is contingent upon action from the governor and guidance from health experts,” Kizner said.Â
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Manassas City Public Schools is the first school district in our region to announce a rescheduled, in-person graduation date since the coronavirus outbreak abruptly ended the academic school year last month.Â
Osbourn High School’s graduation ceremony will take place on July 18 in the school stadium at 9 a.m. Originally, it was scheduled for May 27 at the Eagle Bank Arena on George Mason University Campus in Fairfax.Â
“We will reassess and reach out in late May as things become more clear as to what we can expect from the summer,” Osbourn High Principal Michael Pflugrath told Potomac Local News.Â
Osbourn HS graduation ceremony is now scheduled for July 18th at 9 am at Osbourn HS stadium. Providing the distinguished ceremony our Seniors deserve. Student safety is our top priority. #OneOsbourn @mymcpsva @OHS_AfterProm @ohsclass2020 @OHSCounseling_
— Mike Pflugrath (@OsbournPrin) April 10, 2020
Potomac Local News asked if families were going to be allowed to see the ceremony if temperatures would have to be taken, and if there was a contingency plan to reschedule the ceremony should the virus outbreak persist. School officials said they don’t yet have specific answers to those questions.
“At this point, it’s still early,” said Manassas schools spokeswoman Al Radford.
As for grading, and how the school division will finish out the rest of the canceled academic year, no more grades from fourth-quarter distance learning will be calculated, according to schools superintendent Dr. Kevin Newman.Â
Students’ final grades will be an average of the first three quarters, he said.
Students in seventh to twelfth grades may opt to take a pass/fail credit for a class which means it will not be calculated in the final GPA.Â
From now until May 1, students will have the option to reattempt assignments to raise third-quarter grades.Â
May 29 will still act as the last day of the school year, and final grades will be available around that time period, Newman announced.
For kindergarten through second-grade students, their final mark will be based on their performance through March 13.Â
Feedback from teachers and principals was used to outline these grading requirements.
“Our goal was to find a solution that would provide an opportunity for our students to demonstrate mastery and for the improvement of grades,” Superintendent Kevin Newman said in a statement to parents.
Summer heat is just around the corner, and with that normally comes summer swim season and cooling off by your favorite community pool.Â
This year, however, the coronavirus pandemic is changing everything.
All park facilities are closed until further notice in Prince William County, however, trials at the county’s parks are open.Â
“Because we do not have a date certain that operations will resume, we cannot say definitively when summer programming will be available again or pools will reopen,’ Prince William County Parks and Recreation Department spokesman Brent Heavener said.
In Stafford County, hiking trails inside county parks are open but facilities are closed until May 1, pending re-evaluation.
It’s likely public swimming pools won’t be opened to the public by Memorial Day weekend, as they have in years past. For personal pool owners, it’s a different story.
Residential pools are generally opened up in late April or May, but this year pool owners are opting to open them up sooner than usual.Â
“This year we’re seeing a trend where more people are opening early this year just for the simple fact that they’re bored,” said David Muirhead, owner of the pool maintenance company Northern Virginia Pool Scouts.
When opening your pool, make sure to replace filter plugs, remove any return plugs, and get rid of as much debris as possible.
In order for the pools to be safe for human use during the coronavirus outbreak, three to five ppm is the recommended chlorine level. Pools should be tested once a week to maintain proper chemical levels.
The CDC has stated that there’s no evidence that coronavirus can be spread through pools and that proper pool maintenance should get rid of the virus that causes coronavirus.
Though many industries have been hit hard during this pandemic, the pool industry hasn’t been one of them.
“I think it’s helped the pool industry somewhat,” Muirhead said. “Homeowners are doing whatever they can while they have the time off.”
Northern Virginia Pool Scouts has remained open and taken precautions such as driving separately, sanitizing doorknobs, and maintaining distance from homeowners in order to protect employees and customers during the coronavirus crisis.Â
Across the world, healthcare professionals are at the front lines battling the coronavirus pandemic. In the local Rappahannock health district, things are no different.
At a virtual community town hall on Wednesday, April 1, 2020, Mary Washington Healthcare leaders provided updates with how they are addressing the pandemic.
With a peak in cases not expected for another four to eight weeks in Virginia, the hospital is working to double the emergency department and ICU capacity. The parking deck was converted into a secure structure to care for patients. Additionally, cardiac procedure rooms, post-anesthesia care unit rooms, and other operating rooms are being converted to hold more ICUs.
