Vinton Town Council, Leadership Team focus on budget at annual retreat

Vinton Town Council and the town’s Staff Leadership Team conducted a work session at their
annual retreat on March 22 focused on the budget for FY24/25.

“The session proved to be very productive as it was attended by the entire Town Council and all
the town department heads,” said Vinton Mayor Brad Grose. “Since the town staff and the Town
Council often discuss the budget throughout the year, the time was spent as an overview of past
performance, present requirements, and future expectations. The special work session gave the
council an opportunity to provide direction for the staff and helped the entire group to focus on
the upcoming year. Previous extensive preparation by both the Town Council and the staff
permitted an efficient meeting.

“While the financial condition of the Town of Vinton remains strong, proper planning and
management is required to continue the current level of investment and improvement in our
town.

“The morning [of the retreat] started with a detailed explanation of our past receipts along with
some predictions of our future revenue,” Grose said. “Much of the town’s revenue is derived
from many diversified sources, as it has for many years. The receipts often come from visitors to
our town and provide confidence that our budget will remain in balance.”

While many localities rely on limited sources of revenue, often with general property taxes as
their mainstay, Vinton has several revenue streams including meals taxes (the town’s largest
source of revenue at 13%), state highway maintenance funds (12%), state sales tax (11%), pari-
mutuel taxes (9%), and business license taxes (5%). Personal property taxes make up just 5% of
general fund revenues in Vinton with real estate at 3%.

The Finance Department anticipates that real property taxes, personal property taxes, bank stock
taxes, pari-mutuel taxes, and meals taxes will exceed 100% of budget expectations in FY2024.

“The discussion then moved to the usual expenses of providing services to the citizens of
Vinton,” Grose continued. “All the town departments continue to improve in efficient service
delivery and operation. The recent investment in personnel and equipment is producing tangible
results that can be seen throughout the town.

“The entire group was excited to discuss our Capital Improvement Plan (CIP) which will be
receiving funding for some major items such as a new refuse collection truck, a community park
(Phase 1), improvements and repairs to the Vinton War Memorial building, much needed storm
water improvements, and a robust street paving program.”
That street paving program includes the long-awaited rebuilding of Mountain View Road, a $1
million project shared equally by the Town of Vinton and the Virginia Department of
Transportation.

“After more than three years of study, planning and grant work, I am extremely happy to report
that the town signed a contract in October 2023 to completely rebuild the road from Washington
Avenue to the town limit (near Shalon Circle),” said Town Manager Pete Peters. “The project is
a cost-sharing partnership with the town (who owns all of our own roads) and VDOT, to split the
cost, with VDOT administering the project as part of their annual road improvement work.”
The total cost of the project is $1 million with the town having already paid its $500,000 share.

“The project will begin this June, just after the county schools release for the summer, so that we
have minimal impact on Herman L. Horn Elementary,” Peters explained. “The project will
require various detours for residents within the immediate area, although the project is expected
to be completed in July. More details will be forthcoming on specific timing, duration and
anticipated detours.

“A unique aspect of this particular project is the failure of the subgrade of the existing road due
to it being underbuilt when it was a farm access road. For this reason, VDOT has chosen a
different approach in road construction for our part of the state, called Full Depth Reclamation
(FDR). This process mills down 8-10 inches of material and recycles the asphalt, gravel, and soil
with concrete to create a new base layer, then adds two-plus inches of finished asphalt on top. In
the future, the town will then only then have to mill and repave the top two inches, as part of our
annual paving maintenance every 8-12 years.”

“The session was very positive and productive,” Grose said. “The budget discussion reminded all
of us that while the Town of Vinton is in a strong financial position, there are always challenges
that can be very expensive. I remain confident that the upcoming budget year will help us move
forward InVinton.”

“The retreat provides staff an opportunity to get feedback on the budget development before we
get too far in one direction or another,” said Peters. “Staff leans heavily on council's Adopted
Strategic Plan to guide the annual budget development process, although the routine check-ins with the Finance Committee and the annual retreat are extremely valuable to have meaningful
real-time conversations to confirm priorities and direction.

“The town has traditionally maintained a conservative approach to budgeting, and this year is no
different. We are pleased with the growth trends in a number of our revenue projections,
although we want to provide council and our citizens with a realistic and sustainable budget that
looks out well beyond the present year.

“Council has been particularly interested in catching up on many years of deferred maintenance
and deferred equipment replacement from a period following the great recession when revenues
weren’t as positive and the town wasn’t able to be as aggressive with investments in our
infrastructure, such as paving, large equipment replacement and recreation programming.

“This is also just our second budget after transitioning the water and sewer utility to the Water
Authority, so we now have a better picture of the organization and how to continue transitioning
our focus to other pressing operational needs such as storm water and transportation
improvements.

“The Comprehensive Plan Update, Vinton 2025, is also an extremely important project that will
be undertaken in the upcoming year. This is probably the most important planning document for
the town, as it sets the vision and priorities for the town for the next 20 years. It is also the best
opportunity for our residents and businesses to get involved in their local government and shape
what the community looks like for the next generation. It is a great deal of work, although also a
very rewarding process that I know our staff and council are excited for.”

~Vinton Messenger staff report