Albemarle Supervisors briefed on audit of FY2025 accounts

Virginia’s fiscal year ends on June 30 of each year and localities follow along with their own budget cycles. December is the time when local finance officials present the results of an annual audit of the previous year’s books conducted by an external firm.

Albemarle Supervisors got to see a look at their meeting on December 10, 2025. (download the report)

“The total revenues for the general fund for fiscal year 25 is $458 million with the majority of our revenues in personal property taxes at $308 million,” said Shenandra Usher, Albemarle’s assistant chief financial officer. “This consists of real estate, personal property, mobile homes and machinery and tool taxes.”

Virginia law requires localities to have a balanced budget so Albemarle also had $458 million in expenditures. Of that, $213 million went to the school system and $69 million went to public safety.

“This demonstrates our county’s commitment to providing the foundation for a flourishing community,” Usher said.

In FY2025, Albemarle spent $49 million on debt service and other expenses related to the capital improvement program.

An important definition in municipal accounting is “fund balance” which is the amount of money a locality has on hand that is not committed.

“Our unassigned funds, approximately $89.7 million,” Usher said. “These are funds that are available for future use according to our policy use of unassigned balance funds.”

In order to maintain the highest possible bond rating, Albemarle has policies in place to signal to ratings agencies that they employ best management practices. This results in lower interest rates for debt service. This involves putting ten percent of the fund balance in a reserve and another two percent in a budget stabilization reserve.

“Those titles are dictated by the governmental accounting standards boards,” said Chief Financial Officer Jacob Sumner. “And so we don’t get to choose those titles but there are certain reasons why things are classified in those. So essentially the unassigned fund balance for us or for governmental entities are the things that aren’t restricted either by the governing body or restricted by some external outside entity.”

Learn more about fund balance policies on the website of the Government Finance Officers Association.

Albemarle hired the firm Brown, Edwards and Company to conduct the audit. Megan Argenbright is a partner and said the agency issued a clean opinion in the Annual Comprehensive Financial Report.

“There were no state findings, no new current year management letter comments, and improvements to all of last year’s management letter comments,” Argenbright said.

The document itself brings together a lot of information about Albemarle County beyond just finances.

• Albemarle has net capital assets worth $362,775,012. (see the chart)
• The cost to buy a home in Albemarle County has increased over the past nine years. The median sales price for a single family detached house increased from $410,000 in 2016 to $685,000 in 2025. The median sales price for a townhouse increased from $225,000 in 2016 to $418,000 in 2025. (see the chart for details)
• Albemarle County has not updated a page with historical building permit information since 2023, but the financial report has more data.
  
  “As of October 2025, 1,316 building permits were issued for new residential dwelling units, compared to 1,455 building permits issued in 2024, 1,293 issued in 2023, 939 issued in 2022, and 1,114 issued in 2023.

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