Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, February 21, 1994 TAG: 9402240013
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A6 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
But historians someday might look back on the recent House of Delegates approval of a Richmond regional-government bill and see a milestone in the history of local government in Virginia. At the least, the action is laden with implications for other regions of the state, including the Roanoke and New River valleys.
The bill - approved with votes to spare for the required 2-1 majority - provides for the consolidation of water, sewer, transportation and trash-disposal services for Virginia's capital city and its suburbs. Voters in Richmond and surrounding counties would elect a single board to oversee those functions, which no longer would be the responsibility of the existing localities.
Though the bill won overwhelming (72-25) House approval, its chances are iffier in the Senate, where passage will need 27 of 40 votes. Even if the bill is enacted, it calls for separate voter approval in each locality before the regional government could be established. That may prove no easier in the Richmond area than it has in places like the Roanoke Valley, the Augusta-Staunton area and the Alleghany Highlands. Though sponsored by a Republican from the Richmond suburbs, Del. John Watkins, it was opposed by other delegates from the Richmond suburbs.
Even so, merely the fact the bill has made it this far could prove significant.
Until now, efforts at "functional consolidation" within Virginia's troubled local-government system have stressed provision of a limited number of local services via cooperative contracts or compacts between and among local governments already in existence. This, for example, is the approach of Del. Richard Cranwell's "mini-merger" plan for the Roanoke Valley.
Watkins' bill similarly focuses on a few specific services rather than full-fledged consolidation, and services especially suited (or at least the least difficult to achieve politically) for regional government. But in its provisions for an elected governing body directly representing the region's people (rather than a board or authority whose members are appointed by and represent individual localities within the region), the bill goes considerably farther. It would set up, in effect, a new local government divorced from the smaller localities within the service region.
It is unusual, moreover, for such legislation to arise from within the assembly itself, rather than in response to an initiative from a local government or group. In coming up with his Roanoke Valley proposal, Cranwell took a more active stance on a local issue than is customary for state lawmakers; but even he is waiting for the relevant localities to support the idea before throwing a bill for it into the legislative hopper.
Intriguing, too, is the broad, bipartisan support the Watkins bill garnered from delegates representing other parts of the state, despite the lack of consensus among Richmond-area lawmakers.
"We have studied and studied and studied," Cranwell said. "The people who obstruct every effort to get local governments to work together are the local-government officials. This will send a message to them."
What is that message?
Try this. If the Richmond area offers a good geographic case for regional government, the Roanoke Valley offers a better one. Two independent urban localities are entirely surrounded by a third independent and urbanizing locality, which contains a fourth urban though not independent locality - all within the confines of a small (300 square miles) natural bowl.
In the New River Valley, things aren't so bizarre. But the boundary lines of local government tend to follow not ridge lines but riverbeds - the reverse of the naturally appropriate contours of water- and sewer-service districts.
Or consider this. For decades, because of faster population growth elsewhere in the state, Southwest Virginia has been losing legislative seats. That means more seats are filled by lawmakers with no obvious reason to consult the wishes of Southwest Virginia officials - or voters - in restructuring local government. In egregioius cases like the Roanoke Valley, they may view streamlining local functions as a higher priority than consulting local wishes, especially if such wishes are raising the costs of government.
Someday, a regional-government bill may be not just for Richmond, but Roanoke too; and not just a message, but the real thing.
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GENERAL ASSEMBLY 1994
by CNB