Virginia state delegates and senators will reconvene this week in Richmond to (hopefully) pass a budget by the June 30 deadline. Unfortunately, the current proposals don’t provide the needed funding levels for the state’s transit agencies. Some late breaking good news is that now the House and Senate both propose allocating the base level of operating funding to Metro for its next fiscal year which starts July 1 and goes through June 30, 2017. But nothing is finalized yet.

Legislators need to hear from you again as they negotiate what goes into the final budget package.

Send an email letting them know that Metro and other VA transit are essential services!

Even if you’ve sent an email this spring to state legislators on transit funding, please send one again for these final negotiations.

The House of Delegates budget proposal has $153 million set aside for the state’s share of the increased operating support for Metro over the two-year budget (to be matched by local funds). This would meet Metro’s immediate needs. But if the final budget deal is missing this money, local jurisdictions (Fairfax, Alexandria, Arlington, Falls Church, Loudoun) can’t afford to pick up the state’s share of the tab on top of their own contributions. This risks significant bus and rail service cuts.

Note that we are talking about getting the bare minimum additional operating funding needed starting July 1. This request doesn’t address the medium- and longer-term statewide transit funding issues (like the DMVMoves capital funding for Metro) that we emailed you about earlier this year. Those are still needs, and CSG will work all year with our statewide partners to secure that funding during the January-March 2027 General Assembly session. 

The current budget proposals also fail to fund other statewide transit needs. We are asking for $51 million in new funding for those too.