Inside
Powhatan, Virginia
B1 BSH softball returns to the diamond
Vol. XXX No. 10
March 8, 2017
Board weighs budget cuts By Laura McFarland
broad ideas and some specific number goals. Supervisors asked Weiler to build a budget ensuring funding needed to accomplish the county’s adopted capital imOWHATAN – County administrator Pat Wei- provement program (CIP), economic development ler recently introduced the Powhatan County plan, adopted vision and three-year priorities while also Board of Supervisors to the first draft of the reducing the real estate tax rate by at least 1.5 cents and fiscal year 2018 operating budget, now pro- reducing machinery and tools tax rates by 50 percent. posed at almost $60.3 million, before challenging the After laying out the entire proposed budget, Weiler members and the community to help find explained that making those tax reductions areas for spending cuts that would allow represents cutting $659,611 from the prothe board to meet its goal of lowering the posed budget. The difference between a 90 real estate tax 1.5 cents and reducing macent tax rate and an 88.5 cent tax rate is chinery and tools taxes. $488,822 (a penny on the real estate tax Weiler gave a presentation to the board rate is $325,800) and reducing the machinat its meeting on Monday, Feb. 27, outlinery and tools tax rates by 50 percent is ing the budget she and her staff built for $170,789. the county thus far and how it didn’t yet The county’s fiscal year (FY) 2017 admatch with guidelines the board had givopted CIP commitment is $3.1 million en her in fall 2016. from the General Fund. She pointed out the $60.3 million budAdditionally, for the FY 2018 proposed get discussed that night does not yet inbudget, the departments came back with WEILER clude the proposed budget from Powhatan recommendations that totaled $6.5 million, County Public Schools, which the supervisors will not which Weiler reduced to $2.2 million. Of those needs, see until Wednesday, March 22. $465,000 would be funded out of the General Fund and Based on a 90 cent real estate tax rate, the FY 2018 $742,000 out of Capital Maintenance Reserve, she proposed budget calls for $29,366,999 in total local said. support for the school district, which is 60.51 percent Weiler showed the list of the recommended increasof net total taxes for the county. The total support figure es over several pages in the budget booklet, which is includes a transfer of $22,755,666 and $6,611,333 in available to the public at www.powhatanva.gov/424/ debt service. Budget-CIP. The board had given Weiler certain guidelines to see BOS, pg. 9 keep in mind as the budget was being built, with some
News Editor
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Search for county administrator sees high interest By Laura McFarland News Editor
Prsrt. Standard U.S. POSTAGE PAID Powhatan, VA Permit No.19
POWHATAN – The search for a new county administrator for Powhatan County is expected to be a competitive, quality process after it was released last week that 46 applicants had applied for the post. The month-long process of taking applications finished on Friday, March 3, marking the end of one phase of the nationwide search and the start of the next, said Powhatan County Board of Supervisors Chairman Bill Melton.
With the application process complete, Mercer Group Inc., the firm hired by the county to recruit a new county administrator to replace Pat Weiler, will review the candidates who applied and narrow them down to the top choices for the interview process, Melton said. Although it is dependent on schedules, ideally he hopes to have candidates being interviewed in the second and third weeks of March and make an offer to the top choice around the first week or so of April, Melton said. Weiler announced in November 2016 that she planned to retire on
May 1, 2017 after serving more than four years with the county. She said at the time that her decision to retire after a 40-year career that spanned many different positions in various states was driven both by a desire to spend more time with family and the recognition that it was simply time for the change. The plan is not to overlap the outgoing and incoming county administrators but to have a new person start as close to Weiler’s retirement date as possible, Melton said. “We do know Pat has a deadline and we are going to try to have
State park welcomes yurts to campground By Laura McFarland News Editor
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OWHATAN – Adventurers who want to experience staying in the Great Outdoors but aren’t quite ready for the full camping experience will soon have a new option at Powhatan State
Park. The park is winding up construction on three new yurts that will allow guests to stay in its River Bend Campground with a few more amenities than are offered by a standard tent but not quite the luxury of a recreational vehicle. Virginia State Parks has adopted a modern version of the yurt, a traditional dwelling used by nomads in central Asia, and is using $1.4 million awarded by the General Assembly to build 45 to 50 yurts in 13 state parks across Virginia, including in Powhatan County, said Craig Seaver, state parks director. “The neat thing about yurts is they provide an intermediate experience. You are in the dry and off the ground and there are minimal furnishings provided. Plus you don’t have to make a big investment in camping equipment,” he said. Seaver visited Powhatan State Park on Friday, Feb. 24
see SEARCH, pg. 3
see YURTS, pg. 6
P U B L I C S A F E T Y F O RU M TO I N F O R M R E S I D E N T S By Laura McFarland News Editor
DELIVER TO: Postal Patron Powhatan, VA 23139
PHOTO BY LAURA MCFARLAND
Craig Seaver, left, state parks director, Molly Ward, secretary of natural resources, and Clyde Cristman, director of the department of conservation and recreation, stand in front of one of three new yurts built at Powhatan State Park.
POWHATAN – Several leaders in Powhatan County’s public safety offices will hold a public forum this month to answer the questions and concerns of local residents. The public safety forum will be held from 7 to 9 p.m. on Thursday, March 16 in the auditorium of the Village Building. The event is open to the public. Sheriff Brad Nunnally hosted a similar event in July 2016 in which about 40 members of the community came to listen to him and several high ranking members of the Powhatan County Sheriff’s Office speak about their efforts and take questions from the audience. Because of the success of that event and the many changes that have taken place in the realm of local public safety in the last year, Nunnally said it was time to hold another event. He added that he hopes the public will come out and attend to ask questions and better inform them-
selves. “This time around, we are doing a public safety forum. We have a new full time paid fire staff, a new communica-
Tom Nolan and a representative for the commonwealth’s attorney’s Ooffice will all be in attendance. “We want to give the county an op-
FILE PHOTO POWHATAN TODAY
A public safety forum will be held at 7 p.m. on March 16, similar to a forum the sheriff’s office held to answer residents’ questions in July 2016.
tions director that runs our dispatch center, and the commonwealth’s attorney’s office, which is a direct partner with us in the law enforcement aspect,” he said. Fire and EMS Chief Steven Singer, Emergency communications director
portunity to ask questions, put faces with the names they see on the website and just be more comfortable dealing with the public safety personnel that work for see PUBLIC, pg. 4
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