THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, March 23, 1996 TAG: 9603230002
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A15 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Editorial
SOURCE: Pat Lackey
LENGTH: Medium: 78 lines
Virginia core cities are islands.
By law, they are surrounded by, but are not part of, counties and suburbs, so each city must try to make its way alone. Core cities can't expand their borders. They can't tax their neighbors. They aren't doing very well.
While Virginia counties grew in population by 18 percent between 1980 and 1990, core cities shrank slightly. In 1990, per-capita income in Virginia cities was one-fifth lower than the state average.
Pay growth for private-sector jobs in Virginia metropolitan regions from 1970 to 1990 was less than one-sixth the growth in North Carolina and one-eleventh the growth in Georgia.
Why the awful economic news? Virginia's island-cities cannot compete with other states' metropolitan regions any more than a single basketball player can compete against a team.
If Raleigh needs to expand its borders to meet its economic needs, it can, because North Carolina has the most liberal annexation laws in the nation. Charlotte, too, is an expanding economic engine.
If a Virginia city needs to grow to take advantage of economic growth just beyond its borders, forget it. Even when annexation was allowed, Virginia had the most restrictive annexation laws in the land. Now there's a moratorium on annexation till the next century.
Compared with other states, Virginia hampers its cities. ``We must accept the reality that Virginia's unique system of local government places significant roadblocks to solutions of regional problems,'' said Neal J. Barber, a Virginia Chamber of Commerce official.
The best a Virginia city can hope for is that the island-cities, counties and suburbs will cooperate - will act like economic regions.
In 1993, the mayors of Norfolk, Richmond and Roanoke were comparing burdens and crying on one another's shoulders. Out of their tears grew an organization called the Urban Partnership, whose members include 18 of the commonwealth's major urban areas and the Virginia Chamber of Commerce. Barber is the organization's director.
That organization is the state's best hope that its island-cities, suburbs and counties can cooperate to compete with other states' powerful economic regions.
No organization like the Urban Partnership had ever existed in Virginia. As recently as last fall it was questionable whether the Urban Partnership could persuade the General Assembly to pass any legislation to enable and encourage regionalism.
Well, the General Assembly has adjourned and the Urban Partnership members are happy campers.
A key measure passed. It allows any locality to enter into an agreement with another locality to share the benefits or tax revenue from economic development. Previously, if a National Basketball Association arena were built in Norfolk, other cities could not share the tax revenue from it. Since they wouldn't share in its revenue, they had little reason to support its being built. Now the cities can work together on the project, sharing both costs and benefits. Suddenly the cities, counties and suburbs have new options for cooperation.
That's not all the new legislation will do. Significantly, it sets up a mechanism for financially rewarding localities that cooperate with each other on projects, like a sports arena. The Urban Partnership had hoped the state would set up a regionalism incentive fund of $50 million for the fiscal year beginning July 1997. What the partnership got was $3 million, plus up to $5 million from the Governor's Opportunity Fund.
But it is real progress that the incentive fund was set up at all. The General Assembly has recognized the cities' needs and has begun to meet them, though money is tight.
The governor is reviewing the Urban Partnership measures to decide whether to sign or veto. If he were to throw a wrench in the works, it would seriously retard Virginia's best attempt ever at regionalism - at a time when regionalism is crucial to economic development, as other states well know. MEMO: Mr. Lackey is an editorial writer for The Virginian-Pilot.
by CNB