The Lynchburg City Council is set to move one step closer to approving the city’s 2027 fiscal year spending plan at its meeting Tuesday, after some budget tweaks were introduced to waive residents’ trash and motor vehicle license fees for another year.
The city’s proposed budget is considered a “maintenance budget” designed to carry on the city’s current level of operations without making cuts, raising taxes or introducing new citywide initiatives. City departments were asked to absorb inflationary costs into their budgets to keep them flat.
Taking input from an April public hearing and city council work session, city staff adjusted the original budget proposal. The new version of the budget will go before the city council for a first reading at Tuesday’s meeting, which will be held in city hall at 7 p.m. and will be streamed.
The original proposed budget included a plan to reintroduce the city’s $10 per month trash collection fee and approximately $30 per year motor vehicle license fee, both of which had been waived since the 2024 fiscal year.
The new proposed budget extends the waivers for another year. Fees for additional waste containers and trash bags beyond a single waste container would remain in effect for the 2027 fiscal year.
An increase in the use of the unassigned fund balance, a shift in fleet services funding offset by bond proceeds, and other adjustments were made to balance the budget without the originally expected fee revenue.
The new proposed budget also involves a transfer of about $660,000 in school capital funding to become one-time funding in the school’s operations budget. “This realignment was provided by Lynchburg City Schools,” according to meeting agenda materials, after weeks of discussions of how to boost the city’s allocation to the school’s operating budget.
The transfer does not fully close the gap of about $2.4 million between what Lynchburg City Schools requested and what they received in the city’s proposed budget.
The new proposed budget does not include changes to the Greater Lynchburg Transit Company’s funding allocation. The transit company, like the schools, asked for a larger city allocation than it received and has warned that service cuts could be on the horizon if more funding isn’t secured.
Also during Tuesday’s meeting, four public hearings will allow residents to weigh in on proposed city developments.
One public hearing will be held to authorize the sale of a downtown city building at 805 Court St., which served as the headquarters for the Lynchburg Police Department from 1997 until 2025 and is now vacant. Constructed in 1900 as First Presbyterian Church, the building is currently assessed at $1.3 million, according to meeting agenda materials.
A condition assessment of the property found that more than $9 million would be required to rehabilitate the building to ensure stable future use, and “continued public ownership would require substantial capital investment without a defined long-term municipal use for the facility,” according to agenda materials.
The city issued a request for proposals to redevelop the property and received one qualified proposal. The plan is from FYG Properties, LLC, to redevelop the property into an office building that would create about 80 technology-sector jobs.
Developers plan to use state and federal historic tax credits, which would ensure that the historic integrity of the property is maintained. Redevelopment would be completed by summer 2028, according to agenda materials.
The proposed agreement with FYG Properties outlines a purchase price of $500,000, with a $400,000 rehabilitation credit applied to address deferred maintenance and structural rehabilitation needs, with a net closing of $100,000.
The other three public hearings are called to change the zoning of a parcel on Graves Mill Road to allow a building to be used as an office space; to approve third quarter budget adjustments for the 2026 fiscal year; and to issue a conditional use permit for Liberty University to build two modular homes on Murray Place as housing for the resident directors of the adjacent dormitory housing on Odd Fellows Road.
All agenda materials are available online ahead of the city council meeting and the work session and physical development committee meeting preceding it.
