Thursday, March 6, 2025

Montgomery County goes green...with envy of Loudoun County


The Montgomery County Council is all-but-certain to hike property taxes on residents again in the fiscal year starting this July. They've done it every year in recent times, except for a paltry average $12 "tax cut" in the election year of 2014. By contrast, Loudoun County, Virginia across the river will be delivering a property tax cut to residents there this year. The difference? Not only more business growth and jobs created than Montgomery County over the last decade, but its new position as "data center capital of the world," The Washington Post reported earlier this week.


A shocking new statistic emerged in the Post report on the budget situations in the five biggest counties in Northern Virginia. Loudoun County's data centers generate a full 38% of that county's total revenue. Data centers are often criticized for representing very few jobs, as staffing is minimal at each. But they clearly generate bigtime revenue.


Of course, these data centers require massive amounts of electricity, something Montgomery County and Maryland lack because our elected officials ordered the closure of 8 coal-fired power plants across the state since 2012. High-wage jobs are something else MoCo lacks, as it has failed to attract any new major corporate headquarters in over 25 years. Heckuva job, Brownie! 


While I would rather see an aerospace research facility, or a major defense firm headquarters fill our underutilized and vacant office parks, imagine if there was a data center on each of the office properties among those that have been converted to luxury townhomes in recent years. Residential housing is a revenue loser for the County, as our structural budget deficit proves. Data centers are a revenue winner, as homeowners in Loudoun County will be delighted to tell you, when they receive their FY-2026 property tax cut.

5 comments:

  1. Fairfax county is also going to increase property taxes.

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  2. Data centers replacing the empty office buildings along 270 makes a lot of sense. But good luck getting the County and City to accept it.

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  3. Once again Montgomery County lected officials are behind the time!! Seems that the Democrats in office can not generate revenue other than through taxing an already overburdened population yet they do not know how to curtail their spending! Wake up Montgomery County voters as all your vote does is perpetuate the same kind of thinking and bad revenue planning. Sooner rather than later the county elected officials are going to only be governing illegals and welfare people as they will have run all others out of this county.

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    Replies
    1. They are preoccupied with frivolous meetings, photo ops and banner raising.

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