Henrico County leaders introduce 2022 bond referendum

HENRICO, Va. (WWBT) - Henrico County voters will have the opportunity to participate in a bond referendum to approve $511.4 million in funding for proposed county capital projects.

Henrico Board of Supervisors and county leaders will discuss the bond referendum in Wednesday night’s board meeting scheduled for 6 p.m. The meeting is open to the public.

Henrico Deputy County Manager Brandon Hinton says this is the largest bond referendum ever proposed due to the rising inflation costs.

Hinton says they’ll invest this money over the next six years.

“The projects on the referendum literally impact every area of Henrico geographically. North, South, East and West,” Henrico Deputy County Manager Brandon Hinton said.

Hinton says voters will respond to four questions on November’s Congressional election ballot.

Absentee voting begins Friday, Sept. 23 and continues through Saturday, Nov. 5, with options for voting absentee in person and returning completed ballots to secure drop boxes installed in each magisterial district.

County polling locations will be open from 6 a.m. to 7 p.m. on Election Day, Nov. 8.

“We’ll have four questions on the ballot. They’re rather lengthy questions, but they are categorical in nature,” Hinton said.

Those four categories include recreation and parks, flood prevention and stormwater drainage, fire stations and public safety facilities, and school projects.

The county wants to invest $37 million in recreation and parks, $50 million in improving flood prevention and stormwater drainage, nearly $84 million in building new and renovating fire stations, and $340-and-a-half million in school projects that make up 67% of the referendum alone. Click here for more information on each category.

“You’ll see knocking down and building new, older schools that have reached their prime and need attention. You’ll find two new elementary schools for capacity purposes. You’ll find a new environmental living facility to support new environmental studies, especially Varina High School,” Hinton said.

Hinton says it’s important to note the bond referendum will not increase taxes.

He says the board of supervisors reduced the real estate tax rate by two cents to 85 cents per one hundred dollars of assessed value when it adopted the county’s 2022-2023 budget.

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