Henrico Board of Supervisors approves $2-billion budget, decries 'false narrative' that schools are not fully funded

Before the Henrico Board of Supervisors unanimously approved the county’s proposed budget on Tuesday night, all five supervisors delivered passionate statements about the board’s continued dedication to funding the needs of Henrico Schools.

Tension already was present as the supervisors prepared to discuss the budget at their evening meeting; the board met for nearly an hour in an unplanned closed session earlier that day during a public work session. During the past month, some Henrico School Board members also have criticized the board of supervisors for not adopting the school board’s initial budget request of about $919 million (the county’s budget will allocate $914 million).

During the meeting, supervisors emphasized that the school board and HCPS leaders are in charge of proposing the school budget each year – and while the board of supervisors funds the proposal, it does not dictate “line-by-line” how HCPS must spend the money.

This year, because the state is set to provide Henrico less education funding than the county expected, County Manager John Vithoulkas instructed all department leaders to implement a 3% reduction to their initial budget proposals, causing HCPS and the school board to cut 62 new staff positions from their proposal until additional funding is identified.

Those position reductions have sparked frustrations among some HCPS staff and school board members, who have argued that the board of supervisors should provide the extra funding to allow HCPS to reinstate the new positions into the budget – most of which are staff for English Learners and students with disabilities.

“We have a very high dropout rate in this county, and a lot of these are minority students and students with disabilities,” said Frank Callahan, who helps lead the Henrico NAACP’s education committee. “I hope that when you look at your budget request that the school board has given you, that you actually fully fund the teachers that they have requested to help these students.”

But supervisors argued that funding the additional positions would only cost the school board about $6 million – 0.667% of their nearly $1-billion budget – and that school board members should work within the approved county budget to shift that money towards prioritizing more ESL and special education staff.

“These positions are clearly a priority for constituents,” said Brookland District supervisor Dan Schmitt. “So I’d advocate that [the school board] work within 0.667% of their budget and make the necessary changes.”

Supervisors also said that once the state biennial budget is finalized in May or June, which could provide the county additional funds, HCPS’ needs will continue to be a funding priority. 

“The school board chair [Madison Irving] says that he expects any additional state dollars to be handed right back over,” Schmitt said. “I would argue that a ‘thank you’ would be in order if we are fortunate enough to get state funding back.”

Supervisors condemn 'political gamesmanship' of some school officials

Varina District supervisor Tyrone Nelson also criticized recent remarks made by Varina District school board representative Alicia Atkins in an April 14 Henrico Citizen article. During the meeting, Nelson read aloud Atkins’ quotes in which she said that the board of supervisors was “underfunding” schools and could not “say they prioritize education.”

“That’s some bold stuff. . . and the reason I’m saying this is because it takes a certain level of immaturity to do this,” Nelson said about Atkins’ quotes. “You can make your comments, but the stuff that you’re saying is not right.”

Nelson also referenced statements made by Atkins at a March 26 school board meeting, at which she said she had multiple questions for Nelson about how new county revenues are being considered in relation to school funding and what the justification was behind school funding reductions.

“That person listed the questions in a public meeting. . . we were at a meeting together 30 minutes after she made that comment, said nothing to me. She sent me an email at 10:32 on the next day with the four questions and then posted on Facebook a couple minutes afterwards. So that’s political. Like, cut it out,” Nelson said. “They tried to draw me into some public discourse. No disrespect, it’s fine, that’s your approach. But I don’t like it if we’re not being honest and we’re manipulating the truth.”

In the audience of the meeting room, Tuckahoe District school board representative Marcie Shea and HCPS Chief Financial Officer John Wack listened to the supervisors’ remarks, with Fairfield District school board representative Ryan Young later joining them. Nelson commended Shea for showing up to the meeting and praised the working relationships he had with her and Young.

“I want to shout out Marcie for even coming tonight. That was bold of you. But respect, because we have a relationship and we thank you for that,” Nelson said. “And Ryan talks to us. And I guess Kristi [Kinsella] talks to Dan [Schmitt] sometimes.”

Three Chopt District supervisor Misty Roundtree also condemned the “false narrative” that the board of supervisors does not prioritize Henrico’s students, particularly vulnerable populations such as English Learners and students with disabilities.

“What disheartens me, and I think about how people are motivated for a lot of different reasons to say things, there are those who have aspirations, and in order to make people feel like they need them, sometimes you’ve got to make people feel like they’re not cared for by the people that are in place,” she said. “I think it is cruel to create a false sense of insecurity in these people that really should know how much they are cared for, how many hundreds of millions of dollars that this county has given to schools.”

Roundtree said that the board of supervisors has consistently “gone far beyond what is required of us” to fully fund schools. Supervisors highlighted how during the past decade, $412 million in funding fromorm Henrico's meals tax has gone to school projects and $407 million in budget amendments has been awarded to schools, in addition to annual local budget allocations.

Both Roundtree and Nelson also said that any personal or political issues must be put aside for both boards to work collaboratively.

“I hope we can move forward from this. I really do, because we’ve got to stop,” said Roundtree. “Political gamemanship or whatever aside, we care about our people. We put our money where our mouth is.”

“I’ve never had a problem working with school boards before,” said Nelson. “And I don’t have a problem now, because I’m a big boy and I can handle it.”

Roundtree expresses concerns about planned Flock, LifeRaft expenditures

Along with a large allocation to HCPS, the county’s approved 2026-2027 budget provided new funding to the Henrico Police to purchase “LifeRaft,” an online threat detection platform, and continued funding for HPD to keep contracts with “Flock Safety,” a surveillance company. Prior to passing the budget, Roundtree expressed concerns about the county’s use of both services.

“There are very little guardrails that apply to Flock data that is collected by non-law enforcement agencies,” she said. “And the LifeRaft program I talked about is arguably even more concerning, because while Flock tracks movement, LifeRaft tracks speech and association. And there are no parameters that I know of at the state level at all.”

Henrico currently has about 100 Flock security cameras posted at different locations throughout the county. HPD would begin using LifeRaft this year to monitor the internet and social media for potential threats, planned protests, and growing anti-government sentiment, according to HPD Chief Eric English. 

In addition to the budget, the board of supervisors also approved new utility rate changes that would increase the cost of services for residents by about $7.70 every two months.

Liana Hardy is the Citizen’s government and education reporter. Support her work and articles like this one by making a contribution to the Citizen.