<b>Schools, County See Proposed Budgets</b>
<bt>Between Thursday and Saturday, county officials will get a look at proposed budgets for Arlington’s schools and government.
Real estate assessments increased this year, and last month, county manager Ron Carlee said he expected to maintain last year’s tax rate of $1.023 for every $100 of a house’s value, which would mean an increase in revenues over last year.
But a shortfall of $2 trillion or more at the state level would still mean cuts in funding coming from Richmond. To solve that shortage, local budgets are not expected to increase wildly.
Richard Bridges, assistant county manager, said Carlee would present a "continuing services budget" to the County Board members at their Feb. 9 meeting, a budget that would not add to county programs. It would still represent an increase, however, over last year’s $581.7 million budget for the county.
At the schools, projections were much the same. The budget that Superintendent Robert Smith will propose to the School Board at their Feb. 7 meeting will represent an increase over last year’s $272 million budget.
But Smith’s proposal will not add much in the way of new programs, and School Board Chair Mary Hynes has said this year will be a financial crunch on Arlington schools, with some long-needed new construction finding further delays.
<b>County OKs $100 Million Ballston Project</b>
<bt>In a split vote, the County Board approved a $100 million building for Ballston to house apartments and street-level shopping.
The project, called Liberty Center, will be built on a 3.9-acre site in Ballston bounded by Wilson Boulevard, North Quincy and North Randolph streets and 9th Street North. Plans call for two buildings, one nine stories, the other 13, with 513 houses, nearly 1,500 parking spaces, and over 510,000 of office and retail space.
Board members voted 4-1 in favor of the project, with Board Chair Chris Zimmerman voting against the project. Zimmerman said that while he liked the proposal, it did not budget for enough affordable housing, including only 10 bedrooms of affordable spaces spread over six units.