FCTA 2026 Annual Luncheon: Sat Oct 3, 11:30am-2pm, P.J.Skidoos Restaurant
9908 Fairfax Blvd (Rt 50) / Fairfax, VA -- Meal $50 (cash or check)
  1. Grilled Lemon Chicken Breast, rice pilaf, green beans
  2. London Broil with mushroom wine sauce, mashed potatoes, green beans
  3. Fresh Broiled Salmon, red potatoes, green beans
  4. Garden Pasta - a vegetarian dish
    (Includes bread, butter, iced or hot tea, or coffee + salad; no dessert.)
After-Dinner Topic: "Attainable Housing and County Budget"
  Featured Speaker: Pat Herrity (Fairfax County Board of Supervisors)
  Also speaking: FCTA president Arthur Purves - 2027 Platform for cutting county taxes.
RSVP: luncheon@fcta.org with meal choice(s), before Sept 22
Nov 3 Fairfax Co Ballot Issues
Proposed Va Constitutional Amendments
- [NO] 1. Less Safe Abortions?
- [NO] 2. Criminalize Anti-Gay-Marriage Pastors?
- [NO] 3. Ex-Felons to Vote?

Fx Co Bond (tax + interest) Issues
- [NO] Parks and Park Facilities: $180M.
- [NO] Health and Human Services Facilities: $75M.

What's Wrong with Fairfax County

  • The Problem: Taxes Rising 3x Faster than Household Income
    Since 2000, Fairfax County real estate taxes have increased 281% -- three times faster than inflation (90%) and nearly four times faster than household income (78%). The average annual tax bill has gone from $2,123 to $10,009. Residents are leaving.

  • Why They're Rising: Raises and Benefits Drive Tax Hikes
    Raises and benefit rate hikes for 40,000 county and school employees account for 96 cents of every new tax dollar collected. Not roads. Not schools. Not public safety. A structural spending problem that compounds every year.

  • What We Get: School SAT Drops and Closed Buildings
    Half of all county taxes fund FCPS. Hundreds of millions more pay for county services. In return: declining academic performance, a closed government building, a road project a million dollars over budget, and a public health department ignoring the county's biggest health crisis.

  •  

    The Solution: Cut Tax Rates and Freeze Salaries
    FCTA's four concrete demands to the Board of Supervisors: lower the FY2027 tax rate to $1.08, put the proposed rate on assessment notices, freeze county salaries until averages are published, and freeze school salaries until SAT scores recover.


Front and Center:
 ■  FCTA - What We Do:
FCTA is a non-profit, non-partisan, volunteer organization founded in 1956 to prevent excessive real estate tax and spending increases. We analyze and publicize county and school board spending. We are the only organization that challenges school and county employee compensation. We testify at school and county budget hearings. Over 90% of tax increases are for employee compensation. County employees can retire at age 55 with 75% of final salary. We are working to keep school and county pay in line with the private sector.

   to FCTA
... or JOIN/RENEW annually [$25 online]
... or pay by [Cash or Check]
 ■  Local Elected Representatives ... [ Find Yours!]
  -- Fx Co Board of Supervisors, School Board, and Va Delegates and Senators for Fx Co.
 ■  Dec 2025 Special Bulletin ... How to Reverse Financial Disaster Coming to Fairfax Co
  -- 78% of tax increases go to County employees.
  -- 22,000 4-yr domestic out-migration, 2/3 of Virginia's.
  -- FCTA offers suggestions for reform.
FCTA Bulletins
FCTA Graph Favorites

Fairfax Co Gov't Issues
Fairfax Co School Issues
Virginia Issues
FCTA in the News
 ■  FCTA provides full text of Classics in Western Literature
... The Great Books provide valuable lessons in life, but unfortunately are not emphasized these days. Here are 70+ local HTML copies of books to help students compensate for the diminished FCPS reading requirements since the 1960s.


Recent Posts: Local, Virginia, and Perspective
FCTA Wonders: (1) Is it worse to not learn because gov't schools are closed, or to not learn reading, math, and 1776 history when gov't schools are open? (2) Will Va. adopt destructive and expensive green energy policies like California? (3) Can U.S. citizens' trust be restored in government, corporate, and educational institutions? (4) Will the U.S. return to equal justice under the law?

2026-09-16 (Sch) WT: Why is FCPS in a Budget Crisis?, by Stephanie Lundquist-Arora
The main contribution to the district's so-called shortfall for multiple years is irresponsible leadership and poor decision-making. Taxpayers must demand an independent external audit of the budget so children are not forced to pay the price for the district's terrible leadership.

2026-09-15 (Tax) FCTA: Testimony at BOS FY2026 Carryover Budget Hearing, by by Arthur Purves
FCTA recommends that the county refund to the taxpayers the $460 million of carryover funds not allocated to reserves by sending us checks. The check would amount to $1,000 per household.

2026-09-12 (Nat) Epoch Times: Why Liberal Education Is Dying, by Jacob Howland
Reading is collapsing across all age groups. Little wonder IQ scores are falling. Reading, writing, and thinking are inseparable, mutually reinforcing activities; one can't learn to write well without reading good books, or learn what one thinks, let alone how to think.

2026-09-09 (Sch) Fx GOP: FCPS Failures on a Spreadsheet, by S. Lundquist-Arora
In Fairfax County Public Schools, 20% of students failed reading, 20% failed math, and 24% failed science. Among economically disadvantaged students -- now 41% of FCPS enrollment -- the failure rates were 39%, 38% and 42%. Loudoun's numbers are nearly identical.

2026-09-03 (Pot) OfTwoMinds: We're Living in a Tragicomic Parody
How do we parody a world gone mad with parodies? Every attempt to parody "the news" today is trumped by reality. The parodies are now so extreme they are self-parodies that cannot be parodied.

2026-09-01 (Tax) FxCo: Notice Appropriating Supplemental Funds -- Add'l $3,876,272,355 for FY2027

2026-08-31 (Env) Epoch Times: Herbicide/Cancer Problem in California, by Beige Luciano-Adams
A planned community in Orange County s experiencing severe cancer rates in humans and seizures in dogs, allegedly due to the use of glyphosate and other weed-killers. Repeated requests to government agencies for resolution have gone unanswered.

2026-08-24 (Nat) AMAC: America's Unholy Marxist/Islamist Alliance, by Kelsey Reinhardt
This Red-Green partnership operates through campus activism, political organizing, and social-justice rhetoric that obscures what is actually being advanced -- destruction of the Judeo-Christian foundations of Western civilization and individual freedom.

2026-08-22 (Nat) Epoch Times: America's Education Crisis, by Jacki Thrapp
An Epoch Times survey of 1,378 readers shows that most Americans are not satisfied with what future generations are learning in the classroom.

2026-08-14 (SVa) NY Post: How to Wreck a State in 5 Easy Steps, by Jason Miyares
Political pros have a saying about how our two parties handle defeat and victory. When Republicans lose, the pundits say, they fear they'll never win again; when Democrats win, they govern as though they'll never have to win again. Virginia offers proof of the maxim.

2026-08-04 (Sch) Fx GOP: FCPS Spends $4B/Year, Superintendent Paid More Than the President.
Meanwhile: In 2021, Fairfax County voters approved the money to renovate Centreville High School. Five years later, it still hasn't been built -- and the students inside are done waiting.

2026-08-03 (SVa) AMAC: Democrats Don't Know Their Own Election Laws, by Matt Lamb
Va Senators Warner and Kaine: "In Virginia, we have voter ID and photo ID." If both Democrats had done their homework, they would know that Virginia did have Voter ID until 2020, when Democrat Governor Ralph Northam repealed the state's requirement.

Of Interest:
News Today: ZeroHedge, plus front pages of WaPo and Wash Times
Weekly Vid: AMAC Weekly News -- Ben Ferguson's video summaries, updated every Friday
For Wisdom: Victor Davis Hanson ... Dennis Prager ... Jeffrey A Tucker
Political: Local Fairfax Democrat and Republican home pages
FCPS Watch: Fairfax Schools Monitor, -- tracking the latest "wokeness" from FCPS
Great Reads: Full Text of Classics in Western Literature, by FCTA's David Swink
Environmt: The History and Future of Climate Change -- video (5:31) w/transcript by Peter Temple
Poli-Toons: Mallard Fillmore -- latest political satire by Bruce Tinsley

FCTA / P.O. Box 356 / Fairfax, VA 22038-0356
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