Alexandria City Manager James Parajon Champions Flat Budget at Eisenhower Breakfast

Alexandria, VA – Through the gleaming glass walls of AlexRenew’s sixth-floor conference center in Carlyle, the morning rush on the Capital Beltway served as a fitting backdrop for the Eisenhower Partnership’s City Manager’s Breakfast on March 18. Inside, a crowd of about 150 business and civic leaders mingled over coffee and breakfast potatoes—a robust gathering of the minds held against a sweeping view of the city they plan to navigate through an increasingly complex economic landscape.

Outside, I-495 was a blur of high-speed commuter energy, but the conversation inside centered on a different kind of momentum: a $977.3 million budget proposal defined by its deliberate lack of movement. Alexandria City Manager James F. Parajon presented a fiscal plan that manages to steady the ship without a tax rate increase, opting for a “flat” approach in a season of high-speed change.

Alexandria Mayor Alyia Gaskins opened the morning by acknowledging the bizarre gauntlet the city has run since January. “It is only March. It’s literally only three months into the year,” Gaskins told the crowd. “Yet our city has had a number of unprecedented and unexpected events. Everything from the snowstorm, which introduced a new term into our vocabulary—snowcrete—to measles to rabid raccoons to the Potomac Interceptor collapse.”

Beyond the “crisis of the day” is a sobering economic reality. Gaskins revealed that consumers are worried about spending—eating out less, cutting back on hotels and travel — while a recent Brookings Institution presentation pinpointed that Alexandria has the highest unemployment rate in Northern Virginia due to a steep loss of private-sector jobs.

For Parajon, the $977 million figure represents a roughly 2.2% increase over last year—a number that, when adjusted for inflation, effectively functions as a flat budget. Parajon promised there’d be no tax hike. In a follow-up interview with The Zebra, Parajon explained that rather than slashing programs, the city found nearly $9 million in savings by eliminating 45 vacant staff positions. “We continue to provide existing services and programs, along with substantial funding support for our education system,” he added.

The presentation, attended by Alexandria notables such as Councilman John Chapman, Council candidate Frank Fannon, Carlyle Council Executive Director Morgan Babcock, and prominent attorney Cathy Puskar, also touched on the physical nuts and bolts of the Eisenhower corridor. The room broke into knowing laughter during a discussion of the Holland Lane street improvements; many attendees had just navigated the pothole-riddled stretch to reach the event. Other highlights included planned pedestrian crossing improvements at the Eisenhower Metrorail Station and confirmation that DASHBus service will remain free.

Parajon emphasized that the budget is an evolving process fueled by the granular, everyday feedback he receives as a resident.

“I live in the city,” Parajon remarked. “I don’t think a day goes by without someone stopping and asking me a question. A good example is: ‘Too much debris on the waterfront. Can you please take care of that? Hey, that grocery store is great, but I’m worried, are they going to be able to survive? I love my Safeway, but what can we do when the trucks show up at the wrong times of day?’ All those things really matter.”

“This is your budget,” Parajon assured the crowd. “We are trying to figure out the best way to protect against the biggest risk and also move forward on strategic investment that makes the most sense for our city.”

As Alexandria enters the final stages of the budget process, the message to the business community was one of cautious optimism. For a city that has spent the first quarter of 2026 dodging rabid raccoons and collapsing pipes, a flat budget with no tax hike might be the most welcome news of the year.