Budget

FY2026 Budget graphic in blue and yellow On Tuesday, May 6, Fairfax City Council approved the budget for Fiscal Year 2026 and Capital Improvement Program (CIP) for FY 2026-2030. FY 2026 begins July 1, 2025, and continues through June 30, 2026.

The total approved FY 2026 budget for all city funds — General, Capital Projects, Old Town Service District, Transportation Tax, Cable, Wastewater, Stormwater Utility, Transit, and American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) Funds — is $290.2M,

Learn more details about the FY 2026 budget below.

FY 2026 Budget Highlights

Tax rate = $1.0550 ($0.0250 increase).
Expenditures for all funds = $290,212,082.
General Fund expenditures = $198,691,789 (9.9% increase over FY 2025 adopted budget).
Fully fund the city school board’s tuition request of $71.4M.
$200K for an efficiency audit.
Rate increase of 6.0% for both the wastewater and stormwater utilities.
The meals tax remains unchanged at 4.0%.
Unassigned general fund balance = maintained at 17.7% , exceeding the minimum policy requirement and providing additional support to the city’s AAA bond rating.
Recommended CIP expenditures to fully fund 126 projects = $98.1M for FY 2026 and $614.9M for FY 2026-30.
- Recreation $9.6M
- Transportation $31.9M
- Wastewater & Stormwater $15.8M
- General Government Projects $24.1M

Expenditure Reductions

$5M – Utilization of EDA Real Estate Resource Fund (Revenue)
$3M – Defer schools bond project by two weeks; remainder funded with prior CIP appropriations
$2.3M – Reduction cash transfer to CIP ($9.7M)
$1M – Freeze non-urgent vacancies for one year
$684K – Departmental spending reductions
$652K – 3.0% Police Department spending reduction
$400K – Reduce travel and training
$392K – No Renaissance Housing funding
$188K – Reduce general employee merit increase from the recommended budget
$100K – Reduce non-profit grants
$95K – Revenue reduction to the proposed increase to senior programming

Adopted Budget Documents

FY 2026 Adopted Budget Documents

FY-2026-Adopted-Budget (entire book)(PDF, 61MB)

FY 2026 Adopted Budget (by Section):

FY 2026 - FY 2030 Adopted CIP

FY-2026-FY-2030-Adopted-CIP.pdf(PDF, 24MB)

Other Budget Materials