Roanoke County’s warning of tough budget times is hardly unique among Virginia localities. The state mustn’t slough off road maintenance to counties.

When Richard Flora delivered his State of the County address last week, the Roanoke County Board of Supervisors chairman offered an unusually gloomy economic outlook for a chamber of commerce event where blue skies are the norm.

Flora’s list of the county’s achievements in the fourth year of declining or stagnant revenues was primarily a list of “didn’t have to’s”: didn’t have to raise taxes, lay off employees, compromise services. Roanoke County is looking at costly responsibilities and the prospect of dwindling state and federal revenues, though – and the near certainty that services will decline.

Are Virginia’s legislators paying attention?

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