Presented at a Nov. 14 committee meeting, a study on Loudoun County’s business travel policy found no substantial differences between Loudoun’s policy and those of comparable counties and government entities. Still, the report’s conclusions did little to settle the months-long tension between Supervisor Kristen Umstattd, D-Leesburg, the chief critic of recent delegations to the county’s “sister cities,” and her Democratic colleagues.
Based on the study by PFM, the independent consulting group that performed the study, “there are no glaring differences between Loudoun County’s policies and the other entities that we have looked at,” said PFM Senior Managing Consultant Vieen Leung.
The Finance, Government Operations and Economic Development Committee voted 4-0-1 to recommend that the Board of Supervisors apply formally the county’s business travel policy to board members. Supervisor Matt Letourneau, R-Dulles, was absent.
While Umstattd voted “aye” Nov. 14 after her own motion failed to gain a second, the county’s existing travel policies are not nearly as restrictive as the proposal she brought forward in July. That proposal came after she sharply criticized Chair Phyllis Randall, D-At Large, and Supervisors Juli Briskman, D-Algonkian, Koran Saines, D-Sterling and Sylvia Glass, D-Broad Run, for participating in overseas economic development delegations. Umstattd said that board members’ presence on the trips to Uruguay and Ghana was an unnecessary and irresponsible use of public money. The two trips combined cost about $90,000.
In September, supervisors declined to vote on Umstattd’s proposed travel restrictions, having already commissioned a study of the county’s existing policies at a meeting earlier in the month.
PFM’s analysis compared Loudoun’s policy to those of other counties, including Fairfax, Arlington and Prince William counties in Virginia and Montgomery, Prince George’s and Frederick counties in Maryland. The study also examined travel policies of state and federal government entities, including the policy that applies to Virginia’s executive branch.
Examining other policies’ guidelines on air travel, baggage, lodging, meals, non-reimbursable expenses and funding sources, the study found that Loudoun’s policy is largely in line with those of other counties and government entities.
The study did find that Loudoun’s policy on air travel is more flexible than other counties’, but the same policy is stricter than Virginia’s executive branch policy on flight travel, Leung said. Loudoun’s policy allows people to travel business class on flights longer than 10 hours, while other counties examined do not allow upgrades beyond the lowest class. However, Virginia’s executive branch policy is less restrictive, allowing business class airfare for flights longer than eight hours.
If passed by the Board of Supervisors, the county’s existing policy would be formally applied to members of the board. But supervisors and county staffers said during the meeting that board members are already following the policy.
Deputy County Administrator Erin McLellan said that staffers review and help book the board’s requested travel and would speak with a board member if their travel plans did not follow the policy. “We have not had an issue, to my knowledge, that we’ve not been able to work out with the board member,” she said.
County Administrator Tim Hemstreet said that the board’s sister city delegations were “fully compliant” with the county’s policy. “There was no violation of any law, no violation of regulation, no violation of any policy,” he said.
The committee also voted to approve policy guidance that relates specifically to the Board of Supervisors.
Specifically, the proposed policy said that all board members’ lodging arrangements must comply with the policy unless the U.S. State Department or a similar federal agency makes other recommendations.
The policy was written by Randall, who said she included that specification because federal guidance had changed board members’ travel plans in the past. For the Ghana delegation, she said, there had previously been another hotel chosen by the Department of Economic Development, but “we changed the hotel because the U.S. Embassy told us to change the hotel for safety reasons.”
Board of Supervisors Chair Phyllis Randall, D-At Large, speaks at a Nov. 14 commitee meeting.
Times-Mirror/Coy Ferrell
Additionally, the policy specified that the chair and their chief of staff may travel internationally without approval from the board when the trip is “paid for by the Economic Development Authority.” The chair should notify the board at least 45 days in advance of international travel paid for by the Economic Development Authority, the policy says.
The policy also specified that, other than the chair, all supervisors are allowed to travel for business purposes to all U.S. states and territories “utilizing their respective district budgets,” but international travel must be approved by the board.
“I do think that when it’s not the chair at large, it is appropriate for the board members to come to the board,” Randall said.
Umstattd voted in favor of the motion after her motion, which excluded the ability for supervisors to bring their chiefs of staff, failed for lack of a second.
“I’m not happy with a lot of this,” Umstattd said, adding that the need for board approval for international travel is the policy’s “saving grace.”
“Currently, the board does not have any say on whether significant numbers of dollars can be spent on overseas travel by members of the board other than the chair, and this at least would give the board more information and the right to say, ‘this is not how we want to spend our tax dollars.’”
Umstattd added, “But this does gain for the people two things they didn’t have before, which is advance notice of international travel and the ability of the board to say no to a large group of folks going on a trip when the board feels it may not be an essential use of taxpayer dollars.”
Randall closed by saying that there has already been advance notice about international travel. “That advance notice has happened, and happened, and happened, and happened over and over again 45 days in advance or more.”
However, Randall falsely stated that “there were two votes on this trip [to Ghana] that passed unanimously.” The board voted to approve the sister city relationships, not the trips.
Supervisor Juli Briskman, D-Algonkian, reads a statement at a Nov. 14 committee meeting.
Times-Mirror/Coy Ferrell
Briskman called the formal adoption of the county’s travel policy a “futile exercise.”
“I do think it’s important that we have some measures in place for travel, but I think we already have those measures in place,” she said. “… But I do appreciate that we will explicitly say that the county policy applies to us.”
Briskman criticized those who used the sister city delegations for political gain.
“It is horrible the way that this issue has been raised by certain media outlets, actually with the help of one member of this Board of Supervisors,” she said. “I think the way that this travel was leveraged in the campaigns was heinous and actually put some of us in danger because of the misinformation and the actual lies that were told about the members sitting on this dais right now. It’s disgusting.”
“Folks that did all of these things should be utterly ashamed of themselves,” Briskman continued. “And they should also think about the tax dollars that we had to spend, and the time that we had to spend as your elected officials talking about this. It’s a waste of time, and it was a waste of energy, and it actually caused threats and hurt people.”
Randall agreed. “Taking this to the media and then making it a political issue is not how this body works,” she said. “… Taking it to one another and then bringing it to the dais for everyone to see, to get the facts and to know the facts, it’s how it should’ve worked.”
“The changes that we have here today and the things that we have here today are not much different than what we’ve been doing already, to be quite honest, with some minor changes,” she added. “But if anyone wanted this to be in writing, we could’ve done this five months ago, six months ago, seven months ago, without making this the horribly ugly, divisive and quite frankly dangerous issue it became during a political campaign.”
