Fairfax County’s social service programs are facing a budget shortfall this year as state and federal funding dry up, and officials are scrambling to find more money before the gap grows even bigger next year.
The Community Services Board says it’s $8 million short this year, which includes $4 million in payroll costs and $4 million in operating costs previously covered by state and federal funding. To offset those costs next year, county supervisors agreed this year to set up a $4 million reserve fund for the board, but with the caveat that the Services Board starts identifying other funding sources.
Fairfax-Falls Church’s Community Services Board oversees a variety of social programs for substance abusers, the elderly and the mentally disabled, among others. Some of the hardest hit programs include one for infants and toddlers with developmental delays and another designed to move the homeless off the streets.
Other local service boards face similar funding shortages. The Fairfax Board is the state’s largest and has, until now, been able to balance its budget, Executive Director George Braunstein said.
“With the different populations that we serve, the only way we can provide services to everyone that needs services is to combine multiple sources of funding,” he said. “If one of those sources breaks down or isn’t coming in, it can put us behind in our commitments. People need services faster than the funding is coming in.”
The board has already instituted a hiring freeze, limited employee overtime and established a waiting list for certain services, Braunstein said. There will be additional state money for the infant-toddler program next year, but not enough to cover the entire shortfall. Officials said they would press insurance companies more aggressively to ensure residents’ costs are covered.
Braunstein says he’s hopeful the board’s cost-cutting and fundraising measures can close the budget gap in 2013.
“If we do the same things we did in 2012, we would have the same or even a little bit larger budget shortfall,” he said. “But if we do some of the things we have planned to do, we’re going to be a lot closer.”
